


At the Beginning

by Bearit



Category: Katekyou Hitman Reborn
Genre: Action, Action/Adventure, Adventure, Backstory, Best Friends, Canon Related, Canon-Typical Violence, Childhood, Drama, Friendship, Gen, Pre-Canon, Suicide Attempt, Wordcount: Over 50.000
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-10-05
Updated: 2010-10-04
Packaged: 2017-10-17 06:12:18
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 9
Words: 45,307
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/173775
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bearit/pseuds/Bearit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I'm striving to make everything in here as canonically correct as possible, but this fic will continue to be modified to fit new facts and tidbits Amano tosses at us. If she gives us something that breaks this story, then I will concede and call this an AU. The first two Shimon/Primo memories we were given take place in Interlude 2; the third takes place after this fic.</p><p>This was written for khrfest's Round IV: <i>II-25. Giotto - first impressions; "Well, I have to say that I wasn't expecting this."</i> Each chapter centers around this theme, though some more subtly than others (this chapter being one of the subtle ones).</p>
    </blockquote>





	1. The Storm

**Author's Note:**

> I'm striving to make everything in here as canonically correct as possible, but this fic will continue to be modified to fit new facts and tidbits Amano tosses at us. If she gives us something that breaks this story, then I will concede and call this an AU. The first two Shimon/Primo memories we were given take place in Interlude 2; the third takes place after this fic.
> 
> This was written for khrfest's Round IV: _II-25. Giotto - first impressions; "Well, I have to say that I wasn't expecting this."_ Each chapter centers around this theme, though some more subtly than others (this chapter being one of the subtle ones).

"Remember, my beloved Giotto," Grandmama crooned, "that little in this world is ever as it seems."

Then she closed her eyes and did not wake the next morning. The young Vongola child ran away that afternoon.

Clutching the small burlap sack of coins she left him, Giotto dodged the busy shoppers in the street and avoided the attention of the older children who usually pushed him over to steal what little possessions he carried. He bumped into an adult once, but Giotto only stayed long enough to hear the "Hey, watch it!" before he hurried off towards the outskirts of town.

He did not stop running until he reached the top of the hill overlooking the town. Giotto bent over to rest his hands on his knees and to catch his breath. Hot tears brimmed his eyes, and he shut his eyes tight to keep those tears where they were. Boys don't cry, he reminded himself. Boys don't cry no matter if they're pushed or beat up or teased, and boys certainly don't cry without a grandmother to kiss their tears away.

Giotto rubbed his eyes with the back of his sleeve and stood. He glanced over his shoulder at the town below. He either had to keep moving or he had to go back before sunset. The woods and the meadows surrounding the city were no place for a child at night, and the next town over was a half day's walk away. If he wanted to avoid the orphanage with the mean children, he had to keep going forward.

He made his way to the dirt road between the two towns. Giotto barely walked an hour before his stomach growled, and he made a face as he held his belly. He hadn't thought to eat all day, nor had he thought to bring food with him when he fled the city. Remembering that the girls in town often spent their summers picking berries in the woods, he left the road with the hopes that these bushes would be easy enough to find. He quickly found, unfortunately, that berry bushes were not as plentiful as the overflowing baskets would suggest, and he reached a clearing with a stomach threatening to consume itself if food was not an option.

Giotto slumped to the ground and groaned. He was too far to go back now, but at this rate he would never reach the other town before dark. He was hungry, and he was alone, and he only had a few coins that would do him little good in the middle of nowhere. Disheartened, he drew his knees to his chest. Before he could let the tears fall, he felt a cold and wet raindrop on his nose.

Frowning, he turned his head towards the sky and saw that while he searched the woods for nonexistent berry bushes, dark gray clouds had covered the sky relentlessly. Another drop hit his nose, and then his cheek, and then his forehead, and then the rain spared no part of his face or body. Giotto yelped and curled up over himself, using his little hands to cover his already soaked hair. Only after a crack of thunder ripped through the air did he think to move and find someplace drier, and fast.

Luckily, not too far from the edge of the clearing stood a tall, wooden shed. Giotto sprinted towards it and let out a small whoop when he discovered that the door was unlocked. After the door shut behind him and he let his eyes adjust, he saw that the shed only had rusty equipment, dust, and an old ugly rat. This was no place to get too comfortable.

Giotto found a rotting crate against a wall and carefully sat on top of it, crossing his arms to stop the shivering. Hopefully the rain would stop before too long so that he could make his way back to the road and run as fast as he could to the other town. That was his only chance now. Nobody knew he even existed anymore, and so nobody would think to look for him, much less rescue him.

He wondered how long he could have gone undetected before leaving. Enough time to get food before getting mugged? Enough time to wait until morning before someone found him and dragged him to the orphanage with the bullies?

Enough time to wait and see if Grandmama would wake up?

Giotto did not fight the tears this time, and this time the tears were not interrupted. As the rain dully thudded against the roof of the shed, Giotto sobbed, and neither rain nor tears stopped until the boy fell soundly asleep.

* * *

Giotto woke to the sound of chirping birds and sunlight streaming through the cracks in the walls. His stomach growled, and he curled up into a tighter ball on the dusty floor. He doubted he had the energy to make it to the other town. Did it even matter? He was done for, and only the rats and roaches had use for him anymore.

Just as he was about to discover that he still had tears to shed, the door swung open and the unforgiving sun barreled over Giotto's body. He tensed and rolled up to face the doorway. Squinting, he saw the silhouette of another child, shoulder-length hair unruly and shoulders pumping up and down in time with heavy breaths. As Giotto's eyes adjusted, he began to make out a fancy white shirt and dark trousers on the boy, the wild red of his hair, and fiercely bewildered red eyes.

"What the—" the boy began, and then he scowled. "What are you doing in here?"

Giotto panicked. He scrambled to his feet and rushed past the boy. He barely made it out the door before he caught his foot on a loose floorboard. He crashed to the ground, his chin and his knees scraping across the rough dirt. The tears from only a few seconds ago now freely fell, and he wailed at the pain all across his body.

Startled, the boy shouted, "Hey—hey! Are you okay?"

But Giotto didn't respond, and the boy knelt down beside him.

"Hey, hey kid," he tried again. "Don't… don't cry! Stop crying! Why are you crying?"

Then the boy stood, and for a moment Giotto thought that he was going to run away. Unsure if he wanted him to stay or go, Giotto sniffed and pulled himself up to his hands and knees, trying to calm down. Boys don't cry, he reminded himself, especially not when they tripped themselves, and especially not in front of other boys. He rubbed his sleeve over his face and he stood, keeping his nose pointed to the ground.

"Um," the boy beside him began. "Are you okay? What were you doing in my shed?"

"Your shed?" Giotto found himself replying.

The boy circled in front of him, and Giotto saw that his black shoes had big, shiny gold buckles on them. Giotto raised his head, finally piecing together his fancy clothes with his clean face and clean hair. He was almost like something out of a fairytale Grandpa used to tell him.

"Are you a prince?" asked Giotto.

The boy scoffed but didn't answer the question.

"You're bleeding, you clumsy idiot," he said instead. He glanced behind him and made a face. "You should come with me."

As the boy ran further into the clearing, Giotto touched his face and glanced down at his knees. Sure enough, he was bleeding. He wondered if he should follow the boy or not, but the boy stopped, turned around, and yelled, "Come on! I'm not going to wait for you!" Giotto knew he had little reason to stay behind.

They did not go too far before Giotto saw a huge and glorious mansion straight ahead. The boy _was_ a prince! A hundred different daydreams and possibilities popped into his head, and it wasn't until the boy yelled at him again did Giotto realize he had stopped. Giotto ran to catch up, and the boy quickly and quietly took him around to the back of the house.

"Do you live here?" asked Giotto.

The boy ignored him and opened a small door. Smoke and delicious smells of bread and steaming vegetables poured out and into Giotto's nose, and his stomach violently reminded him that he had not eaten in a day and a half. Before he fell to the ground, the boy grabbed his arm and dragged him inside, calling to the women working inside.

A woman approached them, her hair tied in two golden braids and her wide eyes a prettier and cleaner blue than her dress.

"Young master! What are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be at your lessons?"

The boy pointed at Giotto. "He fell."

The woman opened her mouth and shut it again as her eyes fell on Giotto.

"Oh, dear," she said, looking him up and down. "Oh, poor boy, what happened to you?"

"He _fell_ ," the boy said again.

"Fetch me some warm water, a clean towel, and some bandages," she called behind her to the other maids. She turned back to Giotto. "I have some of the young master's old clothes that you can wear in the meantime. Where do you live, boy?"

"I—" Giotto began, but was interrupted by a maid giving the woman a bucket of water and a white towel.

The woman knelt and dipped the towel into the water. She pulled Giotto closer to her and wiped his face, taking special care around his chin. When another maid came with a small box, she carefully washed his chin and his knees and gently covered them with bandages. She lifted his shirt over his head and replaced it with another one that had been patched up, and she jerked off his pants and had him walk into another, cleaner pair that had a hole in the knee.

"There you are," said the woman, and she ordered the women behind her to get back to work. "Young master, you're still here? Shouldn't you be getting back to your lessons?"

The red-haired boy was still standing by the door, looking as though he wanted to bolt.

"No," he snapped. "I'm not going back."

The woman sighed. "Love, you know that never works out well for you."

"I'm going to _run away_ and _never come back_."

"Well, if you're going to run away, you could at least run this boy back to his home. Where did you say you live again?"

"I, uh," Giotto stared at his feet. "Nowhere."

The woman laughed. "Oh, certainly you must live somewhere. Do you live in town? At a nearby farm?" Giotto shrugged. "Don't tell me you ran away like our young master keeps threatening to."

"I really will do it someday," the boy said.

"Hush, boy, or I'll call Nanny and you won't be leaving the house for a week." The woman gently lifted Giotto's chin up so their eyes met. "Now, where do you live? Or maybe you'd just like to show the master where to take you?"

Giotto shifted from foot to foot.

"I, um, need to get to the orphanage," he mumbled.

The woman widened her eyes. "What?"

"Grandmama is with Grandpa in Heaven now, and the orphanage has bullies, so I wanted to go to the other one, but then I got hungry and then it started raining and then I fell—"

"See?" the boy said, and the woman glared at him before turning back to Giotto with sorrowful eyes.

"You poor dear," she cooed. "So you really have nowhere else to go, do you? Young master, you did good bringing him to me."

"So… this means you won't call Nanny?" The boy sounded hopeful.

"Not this time, I won't. What's your name, boy?"

"Gi—Giotto. Giotto Vongola."

"Nice to meet you, Giotto. You can call me Auntie. How would you feel about living here for a little while? I can't take you to the orphanage for another month, and you'll have to do a little work, but we can feed you and clothe you and the young master seems to have taken a liking to you at least."

The boy snorted. "Yeah, right."

The woman glared at him again. "Go outside and play, or I'll call Nanny."

He rolled his eyes and made his way out the door. Giotto surprised himself by asking after him: "Wait! What do I call you?"

The boy popped his head back in, glancing between Auntie and Giotto. "You're the same age as me, so don't call me anything fancy. And I hate my name. So don't call me anything."

"Young master!"

" _Fine_. Just call me G. And do not ever ask me why or I'll change my mind and you'll have to call me Your Highness."

* * *

Over the next couple of weeks, Giotto fell into routine. Auntie woke him up before dawn and he helped out in the kitchen, running little errands to keep busy and stay out of everyone's way as they made breakfast. After the lord of the house and his family ate, Giotto helped with the dishes. Soon after, G dashed into the kitchen, ducking and cowering behind the cabinets before either a screechy, graying woman found him and dragged him kicking and screaming back into the rest of the mansion, or he trotted off somewhere else.

Giotto spent the rest of the morning doing chores until Auntie pulled him aside for lunch. They sat and ate outside together, Auntie telling Giotto stories about her childhood and Giotto eagerly listening to every word. After cleaning up, she let Giotto go out and play for the rest of the afternoon.

For an hour, Giotto ran around the woods by himself, looking for those elusive berry bushes and playing in a small, shallow stream he found. Then G caught up to him, and he watched Giotto play, refusing to get involved himself.

"Why not?" Giotto asked every day.

"I don't feel like it," was the response G gave most of the time. If he was particularly cranky, he said, "Playing is stupid." If he was in a particularly good mood, he only shrugged. Giotto knew that he should not push a prince to do something he didn't want to do.

Sometimes, instead of going back to whatever he was doing before G showed up, Giotto sat next to him. Sometimes, they talked. Or, rather, Giotto talked about Grandmama and Grandpa or Auntie or what he had been up to that day, and G quietly listened. Sometimes Giotto asked G about his family or why he always ran away from his nanny, and for the longest time G never answered.

Finally, one day, he did.

"It's like you said. I'm a prince. Princes have to do boring lessons about things that are stupid. And I hate stupid things."

Giotto did not know how to respond to that. "Are you going to marry a princess someday?" he asked instead.

G froze, and then he settled back into a scowl. "Girls are stupid, too. But probably. I won't have a choice about it, that's for sure."

"She'll probably be really pretty," said Giotto. "Princesses always are."

"Probably."

"I hope I get married to a really pretty girl someday. Maybe a princess! But she'll probably be for you, won't she?"

"If you want her, you can have her. I don't want anything to do with this family."

Giotto frowned. That was an awful thing to say about a family he still had.

"G, why do you hate being a prince so much?"

G said nothing for a long time, and Giotto thought the conversation was over. Auntie would be calling for him any minute now to help with dinner preparations, anyway.

As he stood to leave, G said quietly, "I'm not really a prince, Giotto."

Before Giotto could respond, he heard Auntie's voice, and the routine of the rest of the day had to commence. He helped with dinner, he ate while the maids served, and he did the dishes. Auntie sent him upstairs to where the servants slept with a glass of milk and a book to try to read before she could join him. Not too long later, she came to him, and he asked her how to read the words he couldn't and she told him how. Then he fell asleep with only half his glass empty, forgetting all about what G had said that afternoon.

* * *

"Giotto. Giotto, darling. Wake up."

Giotto groaned and rubbed his eyes. "Auntie? It's morning already?"

"No, it's not morning, but you have to get up now."

Her voice sounded urgent. Scared. Giotto opened his eyes and saw worry creasing her pretty face. He frowned; it did not look right.

"Auntie? What's wrong?"

"Get up. We can't stay here. And hurry."

She ran to the door and opened it ajar, and Giotto heard muffled screaming and little, dull explosions on the other side. He widened his eyes and stiffened, and his heart pounded into his ribcage.

"Auntie, what's going on?"

This time, she sounded angry, but when she turned around her face betrayed her fear.

"Giotto, get out of bed right now and let's _go_. We have no time to waste."

Giotto did what he was told and tossed off his covers, looking for his shoes and pants, but Auntie tightly grabbed his arm just as he found them at the foot of his bed. He cried out from the pain but managed to grab both his shoes and his pants before she could drag him out of the servant's quarters.

He clutched his garments tightly as Auntie led him down the stairs and through the hallways, always stopping before turning a corner to make sure no one was there. The dull little explosions and the screams and shouts were louder and less dull and less muffled now. Giotto trembled and held his clothes tighter to his chest. He did not dare breathe, much less speak up to tell Auntie that she was still hurting his wrist. She was just scared, too.

Before long, they arrived at the kitchen, dark from the blown out candles and eerily still. Auntie took Giotto to the back corner and opened the bottom pantry door. After taking out one large burlap sack and pushing aside the others, she sat Giotto inside and hesitated for just a moment.

"Stay here," she said. "Stay here for as long as you can, and stay quiet."

"Auntie," Giotto managed, "what's happening? What's going on?"

Auntie looked distressed. "Something bad is happening, Giotto. Something very bad. Oh, how I wished this wasn't happening for another week, after I could have gotten you to the orphanage! I would have loved to keep you until you grew up, but this was never a safe place for you. Now, promise me that you'll stay here until the bad men leave. Promise me that you'll stay so still and so quiet until they leave."

Tears fell down his cheeks, and Giotto nodded slowly. Auntie kissed him on the forehead and closed the door. Darkness enveloped Giotto, and he shut his eyes tightly and paid careful attention to his breathing. In. Out. In. Out. Stay still, stay quiet. Stay still, stay quiet.

A bloodcurdling scream ripped through the kitchen, and Giotto's eyes flew open. His breathing hitched, and before he could stop himself he whimpered very shakily and very softly, "Auntie?"

He quickly realized his mistake, and he covered his mouth with his hands and shut his eyes once again. Maybe no one was there. Maybe that scream wasn't Auntie and instead his imagination. He would not do it again. He promised! So please let that those approaching footsteps not be one of the bad men.

The footsteps stopped. Giotto opened one eye. Maybe it was his imagination. But he was still shaking and he knew better than to crack open the door to check. But maybe?

The pantry door swung open and Giotto saw a pair of black clothed legs next to him. He glanced up, and he did not recognize this man: a man so tall he must be a giant, with narrow, mean dark eyes and a twisted scowl that turned upwards into a twisted smile.

"Well, well, looky here. Seems like old man Guinizelli had another little brat running around."

 _Run_ , Giotto told himself. _Run and get out of here, now now now!_ But before he could move an inch the man knelt down to grab a fistful of his shirt and lifted Giotto high, high off the ground. Giotto cried out. He kicked and he squirmed but the shirt was a perfect fit for him and his legs were much too short.

"Let me go," he tried to demand in a brave voice, but he knew it came out not brave at all.

"All in good time, little boy. After I decide how to deal with you. The boss said no survivors, and I never leave a job undone."

Giotto kicked harder and squirmed harder. Auntie! Where was she? Grandmama? Then he heard two big bangs and he fell to the ground, the bad man crashing with a loud thud beside him. Giotto stared at the man. His eyes were wide open, and a dark red puddle formed at his head, and he wasn't moving.

His eyes flew around the kitchen until he saw G standing at the door, his red hair wilder than usual and a smoking black gun in his hands, panting as though he had just sprinted across the entire house.

"Are you okay, Giotto?" G asked. His voice was shaky.

Giotto nodded. Then his eyes trailed to the very still body lying by G's feet by the door. It was Auntie, her pretty blonde hair dyed red and her face identical to the bad man.

"Au—Auntie?" he whimpered.

G rushed across the room and knelt in front of Giotto so that he couldn't see Auntie anymore.

"Giotto, listen to me, we have to get out of here," he said, grabbing Giotto's shoulders. "They'll be looking for us, and they won't stop until they find us, and then they'll kill us."

"But… but what about Auntie?"

"She's—" G started, and then he shook his head. "She's fine. But we have to leave right now."

Giotto met G's eyes angrily. "No, she's not."

G hesitated for just a moment.

"No," he conceded. "She's not. But neither will we be if we don't get out of here. Giotto, please. Trust me. I know where to go. I know how to get out of here without anyone seeing us. And I promise I'll tell you everything once we're safe. Okay?"

Giotto glanced at Auntie once more, and then he nodded. "Okay."

They stood, with G gathering a small, ornate box under his left arm and keeping his gun firmly in his right hand. He nodded towards the back door, the one leading outdoors, and he made his way towards it. Giotto grabbed his shoes and his pants from inside the pantry and followed G, making a careful effort not to look at the bad man or at Auntie. Together they snuck out the door, jumping into the corner between the stairs and the bricks of the house, leaning against the wall. The dull explosions that Giotto now knew as gunshots resounded with less frequency, and the shouts and screams were now angry and frustrated mumblings.

G pushed off the wall and sprinted across the field and into the woods. Giotto kept up a few paces behind him, ignoring the little pebbles and twigs digging into his feet and pushing the mansion and Auntie out of his mind. They ran through the woods and across the stream and they kept running until they came to a tree with big roots spread across the ground, much farther than anywhere Giotto had ever played before. G ran around to the other side and sat down, and Giotto settled right next to him.

Neither of them said a word as they caught their breaths. Then G said, "We should be safe here, for now. We can't stay too long, though. They'll find us before the morning."

"G," said Giotto, "what's going on? Why are there bad men in your house? Why are we running?"

G pursed his lips. "I did promise to tell you everything, didn't I? And since you almost… well, you have the right to know everything." He sighed. "I was hoping I'd never have to tell you this."

"Tell me what?" asked Giotto, and then he remembered what G had said earlier that afternoon. "You said you weren't really a prince. You're really not?"

G cringed. "No. At least, not a royal prince or anything like that. I still don't think I'd have liked it, though. Have you ever heard of the Guinizelli Family?"

Giotto shook his head, though the name sounded familiar.

"The Guinizelli Family is… well, rich and powerful, but not because of nobility or anything you'd hear about in fairy tales. They're a mafia Family."

"Mafia?"

"Criminals, Giotto. Bad men, just like the bad men who just butchered all of us. And—" He drew in a deep breath. "—and they're my Family. My father was the head, and my name, my real name, is Giovanni Guinizelli. And that's why I hate my name."

Giotto stared at G incredulously. He was not expecting to hear that, of all things. They were criminals? But criminals didn't live in fancy mansions! They were eventually caught, weren't they? Caught and executed in the town square, never having been rich to begin with. They lived in shabby stone houses in the ghettos of the city and did not dress like princes. And criminals didn't take in and show kindness to a little boy who trespassed on their lands. Or, if criminals did, bad men did not.

"But you're not a bad person, G," said Giotto.

"Yes, I am."

"You saved my life!"

"I killed someone, a couple of someones, just to get to you." He held up his gun. "Good boys don't carry these, and good boys don't know how to use them, either."

"But you're not a bad person," Giotto said again. "You're my friend."

It was G's turn to stare at Giotto, startled. "Friend?"

"Aren't you?"

G frowned. "You can find better friends than me."

"But I like _you_."

G turned his attention back to the box in his lap.

"But I got you into this mess," he murmured. "You shouldn't like me. Friends don't get each other into trouble. Criminals and bad people don't have friends."

"Maybe that's why they're bad," said Giotto softly. "I… I think the big kids from the orphanage who used to bully me? I think their friends are only friends with them because they're scared of them, and then they're not really friends, are they? I'm not afraid of you, G. And I know you're not afraid of me. So that means we really are friends, and that means that you're really not a bad person at all."

G said nothing for a long while, just staring at the small box. Giotto worried that he said the exact wrong thing, that G would go back to saying that he was a criminal and a bad person and that they should not be friends. But Giotto did not want to lose G as a friend. He never had one before, relying only on Grandmama and Grandpa for companionship, and he had a feeling that he was G's first friend, too. They could not lose each other, not now, not when neither of them had anyone else in the world anymore.

"I still haven't told you everything yet," said G. "See this box? Father gave this to me when we first discovered the Medici Family among our ranks. He told me to keep it safe, guard it with my life, that the Medici Family can't ever lay their hands on it. Then he told me to leave. To run away, and never come back. And like I always do, I didn't listen to him. I went looking for you first. That's… that's friendship, right?"

Giotto grinned, and when G met his eyes he returned the smile.

"Yeah," said Giotto. "That's friendship, because I would do the same for you."


	2. The Cloud

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For this chapter, I only ask that you bear with me until the end and that you give me the benefit of the doubt. Most of what's going on in this chapter will be explained much later down the line. The biggest thing, though, is that for the purposes of this fic, Giotto isn't the first one to have gone into Dying Will mode in the history of ever (but later, he'll be the first to go into Hyper Dying Will mode).

As soon as they were rested and Giotto had pulled on the pants and shoes he had taken from the Guinizelli mansion, the two boys made their way towards the nearby town of Racale.

"This is the town you were trying to get to before, wasn't it?" said G. "We're not going to the orphanage there, though. That'll be the first place the Medici Family looks for us. But it's big enough we can hide there for a little while. Plenty of lost kids run around the streets all the time, so it'll be a lot harder for the Medici to find us."

They reached the town well before dawn, and they quickly snaked between and behind the buildings lining the pebbled streets. Grown, ratty men stumbled home with half empty bottles in their hands, and many other men and women and children curled up along the streets with molding blankets draped over them. Giotto gaped at the scene around him; either Grandmama and Grandpa protected him well from the sights of the early morning, or Racale was in far more dire straits than his old home.

After G found an empty patch of alley he was satisfied with and ripped a couple of old and torn up sheets from a pile of trash, he said, "Racale was owned by my Family, but the Medici wanted it, too. Father knew they were going to attack us someday. I guess he just didn't think that they'd attack us tonight."

"Does what's in the box have anything to do with it?" asked Giotto.

"I don't know. Maybe."

Giotto stared as G did not let go of the box once as he laid out his blanket on the ground and settled on the ground.

"What's in it?"

"I don't know. I haven't had the chance to look yet." A beat. Then G grinned a devilish grin. "You want to take a look with me? It's not like we're going to get in trouble for it anymore."

Giotto shrugged and scooted next to G. He unlocked the latch and pushed the lid open. Bright red velvet lined the inner walls, and a pile of pointed, golden cylinders sat on top of the velvet. Giotto was in awe of the lavish display; G's family may not have been royalty, but they had lived with enough extravagance to have things this shiny.

Before he could ask G exactly what it was they were looking at, G scoffed and snapped the lid back shut.

"Bullets! To the moment he died he was always wasting my time. Bullets! And they're not even useful ones!"

He pulled the blanket over his head and curled up on the ground, turning his back on the box and grumbling words that Giotto thought children weren't supposed to use.

Not knowing any other way to react, Giotto only sighed with a soft smile and said, "Goodnight, G."

G mumbled something back, and Giotto curled up against the wall of the building with his own blanket. Before he could remember too much the gunshots and the screams and Auntie's lifeless body, he was fast asleep.

* * *

In the morning, G told Giotto to stay put and keep an eye on the "stupid, useless box" while he went to get some food. Left alone, Giotto leaned his back against the wall and stayed hidden behind the tall pile of trash G had taken their makeshift blankets from, staring at the pretty box in his lap. This was what the Medici were after. This was what they killed Auntie and G's father and everyone in the household for, and because of this Giotto and G still weren't safe.

Giotto felt ready to cry again, but he held it in. G was the one who lost everybody and everything he ever knew, and G did not cry. So, Giotto could be strong, too. Still, he wished Grandmama was here.

"I'm back," said G, running up to Giotto. He handed him a piece of bread. "This was the best I could do for now."

"That was quick," said Giotto. He took a bite. The bread was still warm. "So, what do we do now?"

"We need money," said G as he chewed. "The bullets might be useless, but they look like they're made out of some special metal. It's probably worth a lot of money. Or maybe it's not, and we just have to find some idiot willing to buy it off of us who's not Medici."

"But, then, wouldn't they go after them, too?"

G considered this for a moment. "Yes, they would. And they would still get their hands on the bullets in the end, wouldn't they? So that won't work. Well, I'm not too bad at picking pockets—"

"I don't think stealing is the answer, either, G."

"I'm not saying we should try to make a living off of it. Even though that's how Father started off." He snorted. "But then look how well that turned out for him. Well, I don't know. I'm not really good at anything, and adults don't take street performers seriously enough anyway, unless you're really good at something they won't laugh at us for."

Giotto blushed. "I'm… really not good at anything."

"Begging is out of the question. The Medici would find us a lot quicker. Plus, begging is the worst thing we could do for our pride. If nothing else, we have that and we will still have that when we die."

A thought crossed Giotto's mind. "Um, G? Didn't you take any money when we left your house?"

G froze for a moment, and then he cleared his throat. "I, uh, well. I just spent it all. On the bread. That's why we need more money. Bread's not cheap."

That didn't sound right, but Giotto had no desire to argue. He just smiled and said, "I'm sure we'll figure it out."

"Or! Maybe we can sell the bullets to a blacksmith! He should be able to melt it and make it something useful, and we'll have money, and the Medici will never get their hands on these worthless pieces of crap! Not to mention I'll be free of Father's orders forever. Everyone wins!"

"Or, you give the bullets to me before I beat you to death," said a calm, deep voice behind them.

Giotto turned and saw a tall, blonde-haired man standing in the alleyway. He had a scary look in his blue eyes, scarier than the Medici man in the Guinizelli kitchen, but his face wasn't twisted like that man's. He looked more apathetic than malicious. But he was dressed exactly the same as that man in the kitchen last night, and Giotto knew exactly what that meant.

"He's Medici!" he screeched, and he thought he heard G say the same.

The boys wasted no time in picking up the box and dashing out of the alley and into the main street, dodging the bustling shoppers and ducking through the merchants' stalls. Neither of them stopped until they reached a large fountain about five blocks away, their breakfast long forgotten behind them.

G glanced over his shoulders, and, panting, said, "Good, he's not behind us. I can't believe they found us already!"

"What do we do now?" asked Giotto. "If that was the safest place in the city, then we're not safe anywhere here."

G nodded. "You're right. Racale clearly isn't the best place for us to be. We have to get out of here. Today. The closest city is a three day walk though. We won't make it unless we solve the money problem. If I promise to pick the pockets of rich people instead of poor people, will you be more okay with that?"

"I still don't think stealing is the answer."

"That Medici just heard our plans to sell the bullets to a blacksmith. We can't go there. And you're right, we can't sell them either. For whatever reason, we can't let the Medici get their hands on the bullets, even if they are useless. I'm not about to let my Family die for nothing!"

Giotto was startled by the way G's voice rose and shook. His eyes watered up, and he clenched his fists. Now was the time to be strong for his friend.

"G, it's okay. We don't have to sell the bullets. If you want to, I guess stealing from the rich could be okay. Grandpa told me a story once about a man who did that, stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. He wasn't a bad guy. He was a hero. So I think it's okay if you did that, too."

G stared at Giotto for a long moment, his face morphing from distraught to confusion to relief and then to his usual smirk.

"I know that legend. Except he gave to the needy and didn't use the money for himself, but I guess we're pretty needy now."

"But just this once to get us out of here. Once we get to the other city, we need to find a better way to make money."

"Yeah, okay. Just this once." He paused. "And earlier this morning. Kind of. I, um, didn't buy that bread we ate. I kind of stole it."

"G!"

"I was in a hurry! I didn't have time to think about grabbing any money. Just getting the box and finding you and getting out of there before they found us! And we needed to eat!"

Giotto could not argue with that. He, too, had forgotten the money Grandmama had left him in the haste to escape. It was still in the Guinizelli mansion, tucked underneath his bed, and going back to the mansion was not an option.

"Okay," he said. "You're right. But, really, no more after this."

"No more," G agreed. "Well, I better get to it. Can you hold on to the box? And I guess at this point you're better off staying on the move. Meet me back here at noon, and I'll have everything we need. If I'm not here at noon, don't wait for me. Save yourself."

"What? No!"

"If I'm not here at noon, that means the Medici found me, and I'm probably already dead." G gave a long look at Giotto. "But I won't assume the same for you, too. I'll try to find you, because they have the bullets and I'll need to get them back, and you'll probably be dead. And I'll do my best to avenge you."

* * *

Gray clouds gathered in the sky and a small wind picked up. Merchants and shoppers continued about their business as though the sun still shone brightly, but Giotto was pleased with the slight drop in temperature after spending the rest of the morning running to and fro about Racale. Unfortunately, that was all he could stand to be happy about with G's words resounding in his head over and over and leaving a foul taste in his mouth.

Giotto entered the town square, the center of activity in Racale, to take a peek at the tall clock tower. G told him that noon was when both the big arrow and the little arrow both pointed straight up. Now, the big arrow pointed straight down, and the small arrow was almost to the very top. Giotto had no idea how close to noon this was, but G promised to teach him how to read a clock once they reached the next town.

For all the ill words G spoke before, at least he sounded optimistic just that once before they parted ways.

But Giotto knew he had more time before he had to meet G, and he quickly vanished into the backstreets, clutching the box to his chest with his two hands. His feet ached, having not rested all morning, and he found a curb to take a short break.

Stupid G. Why did he think that being separated from each other would be a good idea? How did he think that the two would fare so well apart than together, especially with all that talk of what to do in case the other wasn't around when they were supposed to meet up again? Giotto scowled at the box in his lap, knowing that he would not do what G asked if G wasn't there at noon. If G wasn't there, Giotto would find him. Giotto would find him, and he would save him, and they would both get away and to the other town and not have to worry about the Medici ever again.

How dare G try to convince him to leave him for dead!

With his feet now rested, Giotto decided that it was time to get moving again. He needed to take another look at the clock, and then he needed to find another route. If only the box wasn't so big and so heavy, then this chore would not be so bad, Giotto thought. Plus, wouldn't the Medici recognize the box on sight? According to G, staying on the move should be enough to keep the Medici off track, but what if they left town and one of the Medici saw them carrying the box?

But G was smart, Giotto told himself. G was smart, and he probably already thought of that. Maybe he was getting a big bag, big enough for their food and their money and the box. Or maybe he was getting a small bag to fit the box inside. Or maybe…

Or maybe they could sell the box for more money, and get a bag to keep the bullets in. That way, if the Medici saw them leave town without the box, maybe they would not think that they were the two boys from the Guinizelli mansion, or maybe they would think that they hid the box somewhere in the city and leave the boys alone.

And if Giotto had a bag now, then running around wouldn't be so bad. He could get some money by selling the box, buy a small bag and hide the bullets in it, and then G definitely would not have to pick pockets anymore.

Grinning, Giotto stood to carry out this plan. A jeweler might be interested in a box like this and would have a lot of money to offer for it, and he saw one in the town square just a little while ago.

He turned to head back towards the town square, but he bumped into a big, black, and firm pair of legs before he could take more than a couple of steps. Giotto stumbled backwards, holding tight to the box so that he did not drop it, and glanced up to apologize to the man he had just run into. He froze when he saw that it was the same blonde-haired Medici man from earlier.

The Medici man raised an eyebrow.

"I spent all morning tracking down you and your friend," he said. "I don't like being outmaneuvered, little boy. I think I'll beat you to death for the inconvenience and then take those bullets away from you so I can be done with this boring assignment already."

Giotto backed away slowly, struggling to find his voice. When he did, he shouted, "No! This belongs to the Guinizelli Family! Not the Medici Family! I won't give them up, I won't!"

The Medici man blinked in astonishment, but Giotto did not wait to find out what he would do next. He turned on his heel and ran as fast and as far as he could go, zigzagging through the alleyways and backstreets to make extra sure that he lost him.

Slowing down, he turned around, making sure that he couldn't see the Medici man. The scary, blonde-haired man nowhere in sight, Giotto turned a corner to catch his breath in hiding, wondering how he could make it back to the town square to check the clock so that G wouldn't get into any trouble looking for the Medici Family to find him. It had been a while since they had parted, and he had a feeling that last time he checked the clock he did not have to wait much longer until noon, so he had to make it back quickly.

He groaned. Playing hide and seek with a criminal out to kill him did not sound like very much fun at all.

Then, a boyish yelp resounded around the corner from the backstreet, and Giotto knew that voice.

"G!" he breathed.

Giotto refused to believe the worst. Maybe G just tripped and fell. He may not be clumsy, but maybe he just didn't see where he was going.

That had to be what it was. It had to be, Giotto kept repeating to himself as he ran over to the source of the voice. Unfortunately, his initial instincts were too right.

A group of five burly, black-suited men had the boy cornered, and one of them held him up by his neck, a malicious sneer smeared across his face. Giotto noticed G's gun fallen to the ground underneath him, but the men had little interest in the weapon. Behind the group stood one man, lanky and dressed in much fancier clothes than the other, and another man was sprawled on the ground next to him, unmoving and blood flowing from his chest.

"Now, little Giovanni, you have one more chance to tell me where your little servant boy and the bullets are," said the man in fancier clothes.

"Go to hell!" G snarled as best as he could.

The Medici Family found G in the end, after all. G's words to Giotto before they parted zipped through his head, and Giotto clenched his fists. He did not know what he would do, but he was going to do it.

"How about a new proposition, then, Giovanni," said the man. "We'll kill you anyway. If you make us do this the hard way, your friend will die. If you tell us where we can find him, we'll consider letting him go free so long as he gives up the bullets willingly."

Giotto found an apple core by his feet, and he picked it up and threw it at the head of the leader. When it hit, Giotto took only an instant to rejoice at his aim before he realized exactly what he had done. The man turned around, as did the others, and Giotto could not figure out what to do next. Hide the bullets! Wait, he should have done that first.

What was he supposed to do?

"Ah, here we are, then." The man grinned wickedly. "Little boy, I do believe you have something that doesn't belong to you."

"It… it doesn't belong to you either!" said Giotto.

"Giotto, run!" G yelled, only to be punched in the stomach by the man holding him up.

Giotto cringed at the impact, but he held his ground. G would do the same for him. G had done the same for him back at the Guinizelli mansion. This was the least Giotto could do.

"I don't think you understand, little boy," said the man. "Both of your lives are in my hands now. I can decide whether or not you survive this encounter. And I warn you, not many survive an encounter with the Medici. But if you give me the bullets now, you'll both live."

"But it's not yours," said Giotto. "It's G's. It's the last thing his father gave him. You can't have it."

"And what good would that be if young Giovanni dies? If you make me take it from you, I will be forced to kill him right here and right now, and I will take it from your cold, dead hands." Giotto shivered. "Give it to me, or Giovanni dies, and so will you."

"Giotto!" G yelled again. "Don't worry about me. Get out of here now. Save yourself. And don't let them have the bullets."

The man shrugged. "Or you can do as your friend says and run away. Except then he will die, and we will track you down. There is only one course of action where you both will live."

Giotto stared between the man and G, hesitant. G was the only one who could actually do anything, and he could not do a thing right now. And though G said not to let the Medici have the bullets under any circumstances, there was no way around this situation. Either way, the Medici would get what they wanted. And G had saved his life twice already; Giotto still had to return the favor. This was the only way he could do that.

Trembling, Giotto set the box of bullets on the ground and gently pushed it towards the Medici man. He stood back up and he bit his lip.

"There," he said. "You can have them. Now let G go."

The man walked towards Giotto and bent down to pick up the box. Standing back up, he opened the lid, and a menacing smirk marked his face.

"Yes, yes, this is perfect," he said. "This is exactly what we wanted."

"So let G go," said Giotto, wondering why G was still dangling in midair.

The man pulled out his gun and loaded one of the bullets inside. "Do you know what kind of bullets these are, boys? They're special bullets, recently developed for exclusive use for the Guinizelli Family. With this, they were going to be unstoppable. I wonder what powers they have." And he pointed the gun at G.

"What—what are you doing?" Giotto shouted.

"Testing it. I don't feel like doing it on my own men, not when I have two very easy targets right here."

"But you promised!"

The man cackled. "We are not men of our word, little boy. And the Guinizelli heir needs to die. Don't worry. You'll get your turn. Unless you would rather go first?"

Giotto froze as the man turned the gun to him, and he barely heard G screaming as a loud bang filled his eardrums. He felt himself fall backwards, but he strangely felt no pain. No pain, only regret as he remembered Grandmama and her last words to him, and he remembered Auntie and how she protected him with little regard to her own safety, and he remembered G and everything he had done for him, and how Giotto had done little in return.

He could have at least saved him.

He should have at least saved him.

Something inside his chest began to burn furiously, and his eyes were hot not with tears, but with fury. Before he could begin to wonder if this was what death was like and before he could begin to try to comprehend what was happening to him, one thought and one thought only dominated his entire being.

 _Save G with my dying will!_

Then Giotto had a vision of knocking the gun out of the Medici man's hand and then slamming a well-planted fist into the side of his head. He saw himself doing the same to each of the other men, one after the other with no stop to his movements, each of the Medici too shocked to react quickly enough to try to stop him. One by one they fell unconscious and toppled to the ground, and Giotto remained untouched.

The vision ended, and his chest and his eyes did not burn anymore. He stood on the other side of where he was before, and sprawled at his feet were all of the Medici men, eyes closed and unmoving. A trail of spilled bullets led to the box on the ground and on its side.

Giotto gaped at the scene in front of him. What happened?

"Gi—Giotto…" said G behind him weakly.

Giotto glanced over his shoulder and saw G sitting on the ground, unhurt.

"You're okay!" Giotto exclaimed. "But, what happened? Did you do this?"

"No," said G, shaking his head as he climbed to his feet. "No, Giotto. That was all you. Don't you remember?"

Giotto frowned and he looked back at the men on the ground. He did this? Wait, so that vision was not a vision, but what he had actually done? _He_ did _that_? How?

A chilly wind brushed against Giotto's body, and he wrapped his arms around his body. Before he could comment on the cold, he noticed that he had not a single piece of cloth on him. He yelped and squatted to the ground, moving his arms around his legs and tucking his head into his chest. What happened to his clothes?

"So that's what those bullets do," said a voice that was not G's.

Giotto snapped his head up to see the blonde-haired Medici man from earlier walking towards them. G scrambled for his gun and jumped in front of Giotto, pointing it at the man.

"Don't come any closer!" he yelled.

The man stopped for a moment, and a strange smile crossed his face.

"I sincerely hope you didn't think to load your gun with those bullets," he said. "You know what the result would be. And looking at your gun, and the number of shells on the ground, I know you have no more bullets left."

G did not budge. Giotto had no idea what to do or what to say. Was it true? Were they just going to end up dying anyway? He drew his body in tighter. He did not want to die, and he especially did not want G to die.

"Do not underestimate us," said G finally. "It'll be the last thing you'll do."

"Spoken like a real Guinizelli. You're the last of them, aren't you? You and your friend. Or brother, maybe? I didn't think the elder Giovanni Guinizelli had another son."

G hesitated for a brief moment. "We're not Guinizelli. They're all dead."

"But you have the bullets they were developing."

"We're not Guinizelli. So leave us alone."

Giotto did not think that the Medici man would be convinced. He already knew who they were, and he was going to kill them for it. But to Giotto's surprise, the Medici man raised an eyebrow and said, "Oh really? Then who are you and why do you have the Guinizelli Family's bullets, and why are you so adamant on making sure the Medici Family doesn't get them?"

"We… we're Vongola!" said G, and Giotto was shocked that he remembered his last name. "We're the Vongola brothers, and that's none of your business!"

G darted forward, quickly gathered the bullets into the box, ran back to Giotto, grabbed his wrist, and pulled him through the alleys. Luckily, he kept Giotto's nakedness in mind, and he avoided the main street. Giotto glanced behind him, and he was surprised that the Medici man did not follow them. Then he nearly tripped over his own feet, and he did not look back again.

* * *

Somehow they managed to reach the other side of town without running into any of the Medici or any passerby. G found a huge, wooden crate and told Giotto to stay there while he went to go buy clothes, and he was back in no time at all. Fully clothed once more, Giotto and G considered their next move.

Or, they would have, but what had happened back with the Medici men finally sunk in with both of them, particularly G.

"You were so awesome, Giotto!" said G excitedly through chews of their lunch. "You had this weird, orange fire on your head, and you just punched the living hell out of all those guys!"

Giotto laughed uncertainly. "I… I did?"

G nodded, and he pulled the box of bullets onto his lap. "These bullets aren't useless after all! Old man, you weren't wasting my time this time! I wonder what they're made of. How exactly do they work?"

"G, I don't think it's a good idea to look at those bullets here," said Giotto. "Don't we have to leave? That Medici man is going to find us. He seems to be really good at that."

He stopped his excited rambling, and he set the box to the side.

"You're right. We really need to leave. But I don't think the next town over will do us any good. We need to go much farther than that."

"Maybe…" said Giotto slowly, and then he stopped. He wasn't so good at ideas, but G eagerly waited for him to continue. "Maybe we shouldn't head in the direction of where you were saying before? Maybe the Medici man overheard us."

"So where were you thinking?"

Giotto shrugged and considered his bread carefully for one long moment. Grandpa told a story about a land where the sun rose once. A place of beginnings, she said, and the place where destinies are born.

"East," said Giotto finally. "Far, far east."

* * *

Alaude watched as the two streetrats scurried off yet again. He had little interest in following them this time. The rest of his man had shown up, and they wasted no time in gathering up the beaten and unconscious. With the estranged Medici prince and all his elite now in custody, one dead, this hellishly boring assignment was finally over. Getting a hold of the Guinizelli bullets had only been a secondary objective, and the Vatican had no knowledge of the treasure to begin with. So long as the town's guards held up their end of the bargain, Alaude should have nothing else left to do.

"Sir," said the head guard. As Alaude cast his gaze on him, he bit his lip, seeming sheepish at his earlier jabs at Alaude's age and inexperience when he first came into Racale. "Sir. We have confirmed that these men are indeed Bernardo Medici and his six elite. The raid on the Medici villa was also a success, and we have obtained the objects you asked for."

Alaude only regarded him with a single nod. The guard awkwardly handed him a black box with golden lining. Alaude opened the box and peered inside. He frowned.

"Three of them are missing."

"We searched the house high and low, in every nook and cranny—"

Alaude narrowed his eyes at the guard. "My Italian must still be weak, so I'll try again. Three of them are _missing_."

"I—I guarantee you, sir, that these were the only rings in the house."

He held his scowl onto the guard, and then he sighed, turning on his heel to walk away from the scene.

"Fools," he muttered in his native French.

As the guards carried the Medici outcasts off, Alaude studied the four rings embedded in the purple lining of the box. He knew that the Racale guard had looked everywhere. They knew better than to half-ass an order from a papal endorsed agent; the other three were definitely elsewhere. How and why the Medici had gotten their hands on this, Alaude did not know or care. He just knew that these rings in the hands of any royal family or mafia was something that he could not allow to happen, just like he knew that those bullets could not fall in the wrong hands, either.

Alaude grinned as he remembered the raw power the little Guinizelli boy had displayed once shot with one of those bullets. At least this mission had one upside to it, in the end. He had not expected the snot-nosed brat to be more than that, and something told him that the bullets only drew out the boy's potential.

The bullets would be safe with the two boys, Alaude knew, and even if they were not, Alaude could not shake the feeling that he had not seen the last of them.

"Vongola, huh…"


	3. The Lightning

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lampo is about eight years old in this chapter, and Giotto and G are still about ten years old. And while I worked hard to make the others not carbon copies of their Decimo counterparts, I sort of failed with Lampo. But don't worry, he'll turn into the lazy prat we met in the anime later down the road, and you'll see the signs of it in this chapter. And it might be enough to go without saying, but this is also the reason why Lampo hates Lambo. Likes repel, right?

By mid-afternoon, Giotto and G left Racale with a bag of food slung over G's shoulder and one of the bags of coins attached to his belt. Giotto held onto the other bag, just in case one of them was robbed during their travels.

When they reached the next town over, Giotto told G his idea of selling the box and keeping the bullets in a bag instead. G loved the idea and managed to sell the box for a decent sum, but he held on to the bullets almost exclusively.

"It probably works best on you," said G, "and I'm the one with the gun. In case something happens, I can load them up quickly and shoot you with them!"

The thought of being shot in the head again terrified Giotto, but he said nothing and let G carry them in his pocket. If nothing else, G at least seemed completely enthralled by the bullets, always taking one out to scrutinize every time they stopped to rest, jotting down his notes in a journal he bought in one of the villages they visited. Sometimes G discussed his theories with Giotto, but most of what he said flew right over Giotto's head. Giotto only minded the topics and paid attention whenever G talked about testing them or said something about looking forward to seeing them in action again.

In those instances, Giotto said, "Hopefully we won't have to use them again, though."

G blushed. "Well, yeah. Hopefully we won't have to."

But since he always started back on the subject within the hour, Giotto knew G really wished otherwise.

For many days, the two boys made their way across the Italian countryside, sometimes managing to catch a ride with a cart driver after G convinced him that they were brothers visiting their sick grandmother. Most of the time, they walked.

Those days, their schedules varied in the details but remained constant no matter the weather. At sunrise, they rose and ate a small breakfast before starting their long day of walking. Neither of them talked, G busy examining one of the bullets and Giotto deep in his own thoughts about everything from the path that led him to here to what he wanted to eat for lunch. They stopped for lunch, and if they stopped in a village they stayed for the night. Otherwise, they had a much, much bigger meal at noon and then continued on their way.

If they still did not reach a town or a village before sunset, G scoped out a good place away from predators and bandits that covered their heads and there they settled for the night. Since the sun had disappeared over the horizon and only darkness enveloped them, Giotto and G talked about any number of topics before they drifted to sleep.

Despite the long and repetitive days, Giotto could not be any happier. G was one of the best friends he ever had, never mind the only friend he ever had, and he was always looking out for him and always making him smile and laugh. Giotto did what he could to return the favor, but he rarely had the opportunity. At best, he made G smile, and Giotto decided that for now, that was good enough, because G did not seem the type to laugh anyway.

* * *

One day while walking down a dirt road with wooden fences lining either side, Giotto caught sight of a lone little boy with big, lime green hair kicking around a bright red ball in the middle of the road. He dressed like G used to, before the Medici, but Giotto knew better now: that did not mean that this boy was a prince or nobility. But somehow, he had the feeling that he was no mafia son, either.

The little boy took notice of them immediately, and a wicked and proud grin spread across his face.

"Aha!" he shouted. "Minions come to play with Lord Lampo! Play with me, minions!"

"What the hell," G muttered, taking his eyes off of the bullet in his hand and scowling at the little boy.

When the two stopped walking and only stared at the little boy, the little boy placed his hands on his hips and scrunched his face into a pout.

"You're not playing with me! I, the amazing Lord Lampo, order you to come kick this ball with me!"

Giotto glanced at G, looking for an answer. G shook his head.

"We have no time for this, you little brat," G spat at the boy. "Get out of our way."

"No!" the little boy yelled. "Lord Lampo wants to play with you, so play with Lord Lampo!"

"Quit referring to yourself as 'Lord Lampo'!"

Giotto had never seen G lose his temper quite so easily before, but unlike the past few times, Giotto did not cower or have the need to build up the courage he did not think he had. This time, he had to keep from laughing. The little boy was harmless; what was G getting riled up for?

"That's probably his name, G," said Giotto, grinning.

G looked exasperated as he turned back to Giotto. "That's the most ridiculous name I ever heard."

The little boy cackled. "Yes, I am Lord Lampo, the most powerful and amazing lord of the lands that has ever existed! Hey, kid, you seem smart, so you can just call me Lampo! Now I order you to tell me your name!"

"You little—!"

Giotto cut in, "My name is Giotto, and this is G. Lampo, was it?"

Lampo made a face. "G? That's not a name! That's a letter! What a dumb name! Because you have such a dumb name, you have to call me Lord Lampo!"

"You're one to talk!" G exclaimed. "Giotto, let's just get out of here. We've wasted enough time, and I want to get as far away from this brat as possible before sunset."

"No!" Lampo yelled. "You haven't played with Lord Lampo yet and Lord Lampo demands that you do! Only then will Lord Lampo allow you to pass!"

"And what do you think you can do about it?" G snapped. "We're both much, much bigger than you, and there are two of us!"

"Lord Lampo is amazing and can defeat both of you with his hands tied behind his back!"

"Oh, yeah? Prove it!"

Giotto cringed. He did not like where this was going; he never wanted to become like the older children back home. He pulled at G's sleeve and said quietly so Lampo could not hear, "I don't think we should bully Lampo out of the way just because we're bigger than him."

"But he's starting it!"

" _G_ ," Giotto pleaded.

G scowled and crossed his arms.

"Fine, fine," he conceded, and then he turned to Lampo. "You're lucky that my brother is feeling generous today. We'll just go."

Lampo laughed again. "I knew it! You're afraid of the great and amazing Lord Lampo! But since you surrendered, you have to do everything I, Lord Lampo, tell you to do!"

"That's not how this works, you brat! And no one surrendered!"

Giotto sighed as the two continue to bicker. The sun already started dropping towards the horizon, and at this rate, they would not make any more progress by sunset. But, Giotto wondered, maybe they were fairly close to a village or a town by now. Lampo came from a rich family, that much was clear, and rich families never lived too far away from more people. Maybe Lampo knew where to go, but he knew they would get nowhere with G antagonizing the boy at every turn.

"Okay, Lampo," said Giotto. "You got us. We surrender. What do you want us to do?"

"Giotto!" G exclaimed. Giotto only smiled at him, silently asking him to trust him. It was his turn to do something useful. G gave him a helpless look but said nothing more.

"That's what I thought!" said Lampo proudly. "First things first, you, too, Giotto, shall call me Lord Lampo, having surrendered to my greatness! Next, the idiot with a name that's not really a name, I want you to do a trick with my ball! Make it a good trick, or you will be my slave forever!" And he cackled yet again.

G glared at Giotto, and Giotto only offered an apologetic look and a small, "Please?"

G rolled his eyes and dropped his shoulders.

"Okay, fine, let's just get this over with," he grumbled as he approached Lampo.

Before G could get within arm's reach of the little boy, Lampo tucked the ball into his chest, ducked under the wooden fence, and ran through the trees lining the road.

"I changed my mind!" he called behind him. "You have to catch me first!"

For a moment, Giotto thought that G would let Lampo go so that they could continue down the road. Which would have been fine, since Giotto was sure they would run into a nearby town fairly soon anyway. But then G cried out in anger and frustration and perhaps a little embarrassment and hopped the fence, chasing after the little boy.

"Get back here!"

Giotto felt his jaw dropped as he tried to make sense of G's actions. Was this not kind of what he wanted, for Lampo to do something to let them get past him in peace? But though G dropped the bag of food when he bolted after Lampo, he still had half the money and the bullets and the Medici Family could still be after them, and while Giotto did not think that G could easily get lost, Giotto knew he had to at least follow him. So he picked up the bag of food and awkwardly ambled over to the fence, struggling to get himself and the bag over or through the fence.

As soon as he made it over to the other side, Giotto worried that he had taken just long enough that he had lost G. Then he heard the playful shouts of the little boy and G's angry slur of unpleasant words not too far away, and Giotto made his way to the source of the noise.

When he finally caught sight of G and Lampo, G was still chasing Lampo around a small clearing with a mansion just smaller than the Guinizelli's down a long, shallow hill. That must be Lampo's house, Giotto realized as G tripped over a rock and tumbled to the ground. Lampo barely noticed and kept running and laughing, paying absolutely no attention to where he was going. Finally, he ran right in front of Giotto, and as he passed, Giotto grabbed the red ball from his hands.

Lampo stopped when he realized that his hands were now empty. He turned, and upon seeing Giotto holding his ball, grinned.

"You have outsmarted me!" he exclaimed. "Okay, you don't have to call me Lord Lampo anymore, Giotto!"

Giotto smiled. "I'm glad, Lampo. Now, I was wondering if you could tell me something—"

Before Giotto could finish, Lampo ran off with a giant, bright smile on his face, more childlike and innocent than the ones he flashed at Giotto and G. Giotto followed Lampo's trail with his eyes, and he saw the boy run up to a tall and skinny man in elegant clothes, with long, shaggy dark green hair and kind eyes, picking up Lampo with a jovial laugh.

"Papa!" cried Lampo.

As G trudged next to Giotto, Giotto gaped, wondering what to do next. Maybe Lampo's father could help them out instead, true, but Giotto never met a nobleman out of the blue before. To be fair, G was the only person who came close to fitting the description, but that only made things worse.

"I am going to _kill_ that little brat," G hissed. Giotto looked at him and saw that his fall had not left him unmarked; he had green grass stains and specks of dirt and mud all over his face and shirt. "What was the purpose of humoring him again?"

Giotto opened his mouth to apologize and to answer, but Lampo's father approached them with a grin and Lampo in his arms.

"So you're my boy's new friends, are you? My name is Lord Piero, but please, no formalities are necessary."

"Nice to meet you," said Giotto, but G just scoffed next to him. "I'm Giotto, and this is my, er, brother—" He was still trying to get used to lying. "—G."

"Hey, Papa," said Lampo, "they're staying the night tonight."

"No, we are absolutely not. We never said anything of the sort," G quickly protested.

"You are my minions, and so you're staying the night tonight."

Lord Piero's face was unreadable, which made Giotto uncomfortable enough to step in.

"Um, actually, if you could tell us how to get to the nearest town, we would really appreciate it. See, uh, we're on a trip to see our grandmother…"

Before he could finish the story G often recited to cart drivers, Lord Piero finally smiled again.

"The next town is a half a day away on foot. Why don't you stay the night tonight, and I can have one of my carriages take you to the town first thing in the morning?"

Giotto balked. "No, that's fine, really. We can just walk."

"Yeah," said G. "We're fine. We can take care of ourselves. We have so far. We even have our own food and some money. So we can just go now. We won't impose."

Giotto was surprised that G admitted all of that. Usually he would try to trick people into giving them free food or coin, but Giotto had a feeling that G just did not want to deal with Lampo anymore.

"Nonsense!" Lord Piero exclaimed. "My poor boy can't seem to make friends easily—"

"Gee, I wonder why," G muttered under his breath. Giotto gave him a look.

"—so if he wants you to stay the night, then you shall stay the night! Besides, I can't leave two boys to fend for themselves when I can offer them at least a roof over their heads and warm meals in their bellies. Please, it'll be no trouble at all."

Giotto and G exchanged glances. G shook his head, but Giotto remembered that the past couple of nights had been rainy nights, and though they kept themselves and their food mostly dry, a roof sounded like a good idea if tonight shaped up to rain again. And Giotto, quite frankly, was getting sick of the same old food every day. Besides, they never turned down anyone's kindness before. Just because Lampo was annoying, they had no reason to start now. So, Giotto nodded, ignoring G's exasperated sighs.

"We'd love to, thank you," he said.

* * *

They immediately went to the house at the bottom of the hill, Lampo babbling incessantly along the way. Lord Piero eagerly listened to every word he said, only laughing whenever Lampo said anything negative about Giotto or G. Giotto was pleased that Lord Piero reacted that way; while he knew that G would have been more than okay with Lord Piero changing his mind about his hospitality and turning the boys back to the street, Giotto found himself looking forward to a warm bed and a hot meal. Was it truly that Lampo never had anyone else to play with that Lord Piero cared not for their unwillingness to deal with him?

Giotto realized that he felt sorry for Lampo. He knew what it was like only having himself to play with, and it was a lonely existence. Giotto had a feeling that G was not unfamiliar with it, either, being the only child of a mafia family.

As they entered the extravagant foyer of the mansion, maids and servants rushed to greet Lord Piero and Lampo, a handful of them immediately tending to Lampo's every need and desire. Before Giotto knew it, Lampo was carried off by the servants, and his never-ending stream of commands faded into the rest of the house.

"These are our guests for tonight," Lord Piero told a maid who looked a lot like Auntie. "Please make up their rooms so that they'll be as comfortable as possible."

"Yes, my lord," said the maid.

She approached Giotto and reached for the bag of food that G had still forgotten about, only for G to suddenly remember as he stepped in between them.

"No," he said. "These are ours. We earned them. You can't use them for cooking dinner tonight, or to have for yourself, or to replace with 'better' food."

"G," Giotto hissed, but G ignored him.

The maid stared blankly at G for a moment, and then she turned to Lord Piero. "My lord?"

Lord Piero laughed.

"Oh, let them hold on to it, if it makes them feel better," he said. "Now, go and fix up their rooms. I'll give them a tour of the mansion in the meantime, and then I'll let them play with Lampo after dinner."

She nodded and scurried off, and G leaned towards Giotto. "Alright, here's the plan. After dinner, we get the hell out of here."

"That's the plan?" Giotto whispered back incredulously. "I'm sure playing with Lampo will be _fine_ , G."

G scowled, but Lord Piero gently pushed the boys towards a long hallway to the side of the foyer and excitedly began talking about how wonderful it was to have guests again, and how much they would love the many, many treasures he and his father and his father's father have gathered over the years, and how lovely it was that Lampo finally had friends, even if it was only for today since they had to leave tomorrow.

Giotto and G remained quiet during the tour as they walked past paintings and weird statues and other random little trinkets that Lord Piero would often linger on, telling them stories of wars long past and of kings of countries now long gone. Giotto recognized some of the stories as ones that Grandpa used to tell, and others were new to him. He listened to every word Lord Piero said eagerly, but even though G did not speak, Giotto had the distinct feeling but the distant look on his face that G was not paying attention.

An hour or two later, after they explored what had to be nearly every hallway of the house upstairs and downstairs and most of the rooms, Lord Piero led them to the biggest room yet. The room had a shiny, wooden and long table stretched along the center of the room with big, red chairs lining either side. The walls were covered with more paintings, and a couple of the weird statues lurked in the corners. Maids and servants hurried to and fro through the door on the other side, carrying plates of food that made Giotto's belly rumble.

Lampo sat at one end of the table, bossing around the maids and servants who heeded his every order. Lord Piero paid no mind to his son's behavior and directed Giotto and G to the seats next to Lampo before taking his own on the other side.

Once Lord Piero was out of earshot, G turned to Giotto and said, "It's official. This place is hell."

"It's not that bad—"

"Hell, Giotto. Hell." He waited for a maid to finish placing a plate of steaming carrots on the table, and then continued. "We have to entertain his sorry excuse of a son not only here at dinner but _all night long_ , the man himself is insufferable, the maids and the servants are probably going to rob us, and everything in this house is pure junk."

"Really? I thought he had a lot of amazing things," said Giotto. "Like that statue from, where was it? Rome? The big man with the huge beard and the thunderbolt in his hand?"

"Jupiter," said G, "and it's junk. It didn't even come from Rome, I don't think. It looks too new. So, junk. Just like that cloak he had on display in his office. It looks pretty, but the jewels are too obviously fake. Junk."

Giotto frowned. He did not want to bring this up again, but G needed to quiet down before Lord Piero overheard him.

"But, G, didn't you say that once about the bullets?"

"But they were obviously made out of a special type of metal. I only called them useless, not junk. Even before knowing what they could do, I knew it was worth a lot of money."

"But you were still wrong about them."

"I…" said G, and then he sighed. "Fine, I get it. I still don't think that this family is going to last another fifty years or so."

He glanced at Lampo, who had already started digging into the food without waiting for the last plate to be served and continued to shout orders and nonsensical things.

"Make that twenty, or however long it takes for his father to kick the bucket."

* * *

That was the last of the openly rude things G said for the rest of the night. Lampo lost interest in playing with either of the boys after dinner, and Lord Piero apologized and instead showed them to their rooms. Giotto's room was bigger than the whole of the little house Grandpa bought for Grandmama and the bed softer and with more pillows than he ever thought a single person could ever need. The maids even made sure to leave him the whitest and silkiest nightclothes at the foot of his bed, and Giotto enjoyed the feel of them on his skin. No sooner had he dressed, a maid swooped in and took his dirty old clothes and left him with a tray of desserts and drinks in its place.

Giotto grinned as he dug into the cake left behind, the sweet crumbs in his mouth bringing a smile to his face. And G wanted to turn down Lord Piero's offer! Though Lampo was annoying, at least for this one night, they could live like royalty.

G came into his room after the maids had taken the desserts away, every last crumb in Giotto's belly, with his journal and a bullet and Giotto was certain his gun, too. As they sat on Giotto's bed, G talked more about his theories regarding the bullets, and Giotto nodded along. It was just like if they were sitting underneath a tree or in a small cave, just with fancier and cleaner clothes and with a much softer bed than the dirt. And just like usual, both were quickly fast asleep.

Unlike usual, however, Giotto did not rise from the sun's rays hitting his face or G nudging him awake. A loud crash and a little boy's wailing from the other side of the wall woke him, and he sat up, rubbing his eyes and taking a moment to remember that he was in a fancy mansion. More screams and wailing came from the other room, and Giotto remembered that Lord Piero told him that their rooms would be right next to Lampo's just in case the boy changed his mind.

"Great, that brat can't even let us have a good night's rest, can he?" G mumbled as he groggily sat up. "Can I go kill him now?"

A loud, dull thud resounded, and Giotto cringed.

"Um, maybe something's wrong," he said.

"Yeah. He woke us up. That's what's wrong."

"Listen, G. Something about what's going on in there doesn't sound right."

Both of them listened for a short moment, hearing only more wailing and screaming from Lampo and then they heard a couple of male voices that definitely did not belong to Lord Piero.

"Maybe someone's trying to beat me to it," G growled. Giotto hopped off the bed and headed for the hallway. "Wait, where are you going?"

"I'm just going to make sure he's okay," said Giotto as he pushed open the door. He left into the hallway, G's protests following him.

"And what if he's not? Giotto, it's not safe. Come back here! That's what his servants are for! Damn it."

Giotto reached the door to Lampo's room, and with G right next to him now, he slowly opened the door and peered inside. In the middle of the room, three big, black-suited men struggled to put a piece of cloth into Lampo's mouth, but Lampo kept spitting it out and only screamed louder. Another man held a bag big enough to fit Lampo. His dresser and nightstand had toppled over, and a huge hole was in the glass of his window.

The men, too preoccupied with Lampo, did not notice the door open, so Giotto knew that they were safe for now. G pulled Giotto away from the door so that the kidnappers could not see and swore.

"I was only joking!" he exclaimed in a harsh whisper. "What do we do? Should we get Piero?"

Giotto shook his head. "I don't know. Probably. But would it be too late?"

That was when Lord Piero came running down the hall, a candle in his hand and a funny-looking nightcap on his head.

"What is it? What's going on? I thought I heard Lampo screaming."

"I, er, well—" Giotto started, and then he nodded towards the door. "There are bad men in there—"

Lord Piero did not need more of an explanation than that. He threw the door open, and, upon seeing the sight of the men manhandling his son, yelled, "Unhand him, you bastards!"

The men in black froze, and Lampo stopped wailing and stared at his father blankly. Giotto sighed with relief. Maybe the kidnappers would be scared off, he thought. But not another moment passed before the man holding the bag pulled out a gun and aimed it at Lord Piero.

"We were hoping it wouldn't come to this, Piero," the man snarled. "But it looks like we have no choice but to kill both you and your son, now."

Lord Piero's face turned white. "Wait… wait! Why are you doing this? What do you want?"

"We wanted you to step down as lord of the land," said the man. "We were hoping to kidnap your son and hold him for ransom to get you to concede, but it looks like death is how we'll get you to resign."

"G," said Giotto quickly. "Shoot me with those bullets."

"Wait, what?"

"Shoot me with one of those bullets, G," said Giotto again. "Hurry. We don't have much time."

G hesitated, and Giotto almost started yelling, until he answered, "I… I don't think these bullets work like that."

"What?"

"Something you said last time you were hit by them… I don't think it works the way you think it does."

"We won't know unless we try, right? So shoot me!"

"But you might die!"

There was a click of a gun that was not G's, and the two boys snapped their attention back to the kidnappers. The man had a fiercely determined look in his eye, and he spat as he said, "You die now, you son of a bitch. You die and so does your son and these other little boys you have at your feet. Your nephews? Never mind, you'll just lie to save them because they are your heirs, too, somehow. So die."

"No!" Lampo screamed, and he pulled a chain around his neck out from under his shirt and stuck his finger through a ring attached to it. "No! You leave Papa and my new friends _alone_!"

As he yelled the last word, a flash of green lit up the room as spikes radiated from the ring. Soon, the spikes jetted out and away from Lampo in all directions, hitting all four kidnappers and any object in the room. Lord Piero yelped before the green lightning reached him, hopping to the safety of the hallway where Giotto and G stood. The three of them gaped as the kidnappers screamed from the electric shock before falling unconscious and smoking to the ground.

The green spikes receded, and Lampo, now on the ground, sniffed and said under his breath, "Leave Papa and my new friends _alone_."

He, too, fell to the ground unconscious, and Lord Piero quickly ran to him and called out for one of his servants to grab a doctor.

G turned to Giotto wide-eyed and said, "Well. I was not expecting _that_."

* * *

Giotto and G, having not been able to get back to sleep after the servants helped Lord Piero make sure Lampo had not suffered any real damage from the attack, had to be helped into the carriages that Lord Piero arranged for them to take to town. He handed them an extra bag of food and a small bag of coins to help them on their journey, on top of a new set of clothes because their old ones just could not be cleaned well enough.

"Thank you," said Giotto. G, grumpy from the lack of sleep, said nothing.

"And I have something else to give you," Lord Piero said, waving a servant over. The servant carried what looked to be another bundle of clothes. "This is my appreciation, for helping my son yesterday."

"Helping?" Giotto asked. "You mean last night?"

That was when G spoke up. "We didn't actually do anything."

Lord Piero only responded by handing the bundle to Giotto. "You are a true friend to Lampo, and because of that, I wanted to give you some of my treasures. One is to help when the winter comes, in case you don't get to your grandmother's in time. The other, well, the other is a companion to Lampo's ring."

Giotto gaped as he noticed that on top of the bundle laid a ring, a sky blue jewel in the center and with a rainbow of colors on its border. It was shiny enough that even G leaned forward to examine it.

"Not junk," he cooed. "Lampo has one like it?"

"His is a little different, and green," said Lord Pielo. "A peddler sold them to me for a decent sum of money, and I would have passed them up had something not… called me to them. I had no idea what it could actually do. I'm holding on to Lampo's, for now, but I have a feeling that it's time that I pass that one onto you."

G fingered through the clothes beneath it.

"Hey, this is the cloak from your study," he said. He frowned. "You're just giving this to us? Isn't it worth a lot of money?" He mouthed to Giotto, "This probably isn't junk, either."

"Money is no object when it comes to my son," said Lord Piero. "There's another one beneath it, which is Lampo's, which cost me a fortune more than the other one, but they'll keep you warm. And who knows? Maybe you'll unlock the secrets with them."

Giotto mustered up the best smile he could.

"Thank you," he said. "Thank you very much. This is… this is too much, but thank you."

"No, no, I'm the one who should be thanking you," said Lord Piero with a grin. "You're welcome to my estate anytime. I do hope you come by when and if you make your trip home from your grandmother's. Lampo would love to see you again, and I would love to see if you can make anything similar happen with the ring I just gave you."

Giotto nodded. "Thank you, and we'll try to come by again," he said, and G snorted beside him.

The carriage drove off, and Giotto put on the ring Lord Piero had given him and smiled.


	4. The Sun, Side A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Giotto and G are now a few months older at about 11 years old, and Knuckle is about 20 years old. I know that men can't become priests until they reach the age of 25, but I hope you can forgive the breaking of real life canon here. And I promise Knuckle's Italian will improve. His language will not be broken for very long.

Within a few months, the boys made good use of the cloaks Lord Piero had given them. The days grew shorter and the leaves changed color, and as they headed more and more east the colder the temperatures dropped. Villages and towns became few and far between. Giotto had a harder and harder time communicating with the common passerby though G did splendidly enough for the both of them, enough to get them a ride in the bitter cold of the autumn and winter every time they traveled to a new town. Just before the solstice, they reached their final destination, at least until the winter ended.

G explained to Giotto that the merchant they traveled with and the townspeople all said the same thing: the next town east of Solntse was at least a month away on foot and in a land that nobody was too familiar with. After doing his business in town, the merchant offered to take them back to his home until the snow melted. G declined, something that Giotto soon felt that his friend regretted despite the boy's reassurances that he turned it down because he knew that west was the exact opposite direction Giotto wanted to go.

The townspeople all offered the boys food and coin and pointed them in the same direction for shelter: the center of town, where the church, the largest building in Solntse, stood. Giotto could not make out the words G grumbled under his breath as they made their way to the stone-walled church, and it made him uneasy. Giotto had never been inside a church before, but everything he ever heard about it had been nothing but good. If G seemed unhappy at the prospect, perhaps they were not as grand as Grandmama and Grandpa and the other children often said?

As the boys stood at the large, wooden doors of the church, G turned to Giotto and said, "Maybe we'd be better off trying our luck on the streets. The cloaks have been keeping us plenty warm."

Giotto stared at him, trying to find the best way both to ask what was wrong with going to the church for help and to point out that they would likely find nothing but bad luck on the streets. But his silence seemed to have sufficed.

"Never mind," sighed G. "Let's just get this over with. But we're bailing at the first sign of trouble."

As G pushed the doors open, Giotto wondered exactly what kind of trouble they would find at a church. The people inside were supposed to be holy, weren't they? And weren't churches supposed to be houses of God, a sanctuary for all his faithful? But when Giotto cast his gaze to the inside of the church, all his worries vanished in an instant.

Beautifully stained glass windows of reds, blues, greens, and yellows, illuminated by the sun's rays, lit up the wooden benches lining the center of the great room. The wooden benches sat in perfect rows with one long aisle stretching down the center to a marble altar at the front. Lit candles stood on either end of the altar, and a small, wooden slab with a thick, leather bound book took center stage. On the wall behind the altar hung a simple golden cross, overpowering the presence of anything else within the church.

"We need to go," said G, startling Giotto out of his gawking.

"What? Why?" asked Giotto as G turned back towards the cold. "Nothing's happened yet."

"I just have a bad feeling about this." As if that was all the explanation Giotto needed.

"But G—"

A young man appeared before them then, a man in black and red robes with yellow trimming. Around his neck was a small wooden cross, and Giotto knew, based on what Grandpa told him once about the men who lived in the church, that he was a priest. His untamed hair was jet black, and though his eyes were kind his smile had an odd intensity about him. He spoke in the same language as the others in Solntse, so while Giotto could not understand his words, G did.

G turned back around and replied to the priest with an angry spat, but the priest kept calm in appearance and in voice. Giotto grew nervous at the exchange, and while he trusted G he was unsure if antagonizing someone affiliated with the church was a good idea, even if the priest seemed mostly unfazed by G's obvious rudeness. At the very least, G could at least fill Giotto in on why coming to a church was a bad idea.

"G," Giotto interrupted one of his friend's angry retorts. "What's going on?"

G did not take his scowl away from the man.

"Nothing," he said. "We're leaving."

As he made an about face while grabbing Giotto's arm, and as he opened his mouth to say one last something to the priest, the priest grinned even wider and said in a thick accent, "Oh, you are Italian!"

G froze, and Giotto smiled.

"You can speak our language?" he exclaimed.

The priest nodded. "It is the language of the Vatican. I am still bad, but I have been studying it extremely hard. I am extremely happy to be able to speak it with a, how you say… native?"

G rolled his eyes.

"Perfect," he muttered. "I didn't think priests were required to learn Italian."

"No," said the priest. "It is something I wanted to learn for myself. It looks like it will paying off. I guess I am better asking your friend—" He looked at Giotto, still grinning. "How may I help you?"

Giotto glanced at G, who rolled his eyes and shrugged.

"We—well," Giotto started, "we… we were—well, that is, we're heading east. To visit our grandmother. And we were told we can't go much more east until winter is over and I think the people in town told us to come here…?"

He looked at G again for confirmation, and again, he just shrugged.

"The people of Solntse are good people," said the priest. "I am certain that any of them would have let you stay with them until spring, but since it is winter, they are needing to provide for their own families. But that is why there is a church. You can stay here. I give you warm beds and meals."

"We don't want charity," G spat. Giotto glared at him. Why was it that every time someone offered something wonderful like the whole package of food and shelter at no cost did G have to protest?

The priest laughed. "Then you do not have to be accepting it. But I will not turn you out even if you cannot pay. That is not what church stands for."

"Then it's still charity, isn't it?"

"We'll take it," Giotto cut in, not wanting to run the priest's patient offer thin, even if it was the priest's job to give them all of this. "We'll do whatever you need us to do in exchange for the food and the shelter. Or even just the shelter. I think we can get by with the food on our own."

"Do whatever makes you happy," said the priest. "I will accept whatever you can give, even if you give nothing. You two will not, hm… survive…? In the extreme cold, and I cannot be letting you go out when the worst of winter has not come. I only ask that you are not causing trouble while you stay in Solntse. Here, I will show you where you can sleep and keep your things."

* * *

The people of Solntse called the priest Father, and Giotto quickly fell into the habit of doing so as well. "When in Rome, do as the Romans do," Grandmama once told him.

Since Father told him that winters here were long and hard and the snow did not melt for a couple months longer than in the warmer regions of Europe, Giotto decided it was best to integrate himself into the town as best and as quickly as he could. He helped Father around the church and, when Father did not have anything for him to do, he did his best to help the townspeople. And whenever Father gave his sermons, since all of Solntse attended them, Giotto made sure to be there, too, often enthralled by Father's enthusiasm and intensity and volume.

The language barrier proved to be a difficult one to break through, but G taught it to him at night before they fell asleep.

G, on the other hand, probably never heard the saying about the Romans before. He referred to Father as anything but and none of it very nice at all. When Giotto helped Father in the church, G stayed in their room and went over his notes and wrote some more on his Family's bullets and, lately, the ring and cloaks Lord Piero had given them. If Giotto left the church to help the townspeople, G tagged along but only to serve as a translator, regarding the people of Solntse in disdain. He said little to them otherwise. And when Giotto and the rest of Solntse sat in the church during Father's services, G was nowhere to be found.

It was during one of the evening services Father performed that G barged through the front doors of the church, interrupting a hauntingly beautiful hymn that Giotto always enjoyed listening and had only begun learning the words to. He yelled something in Russian, and since Giotto sat near the aisle he thought to pull him into the pew to get him to quiet down.

Before he could, a collective gasp rang through the room as everyone turned their gaze towards the doors. Giotto followed, and he, too, gaped at the scene before them. A man held up a bloodied and bruised and barely conscious man against his side, his arm around the injured man's waist and the injured man's arm slung around his shoulders. He limped towards the altar where Father stood.

Father said something to the congregation, and with disquiet murmurings everyone filed out of the church. Giotto did not follow suit of the rest of Solntse and instead ran to G's side.

"What's going on? What happened?" he asked.

G said nothing, his horrified eyes locked onto the men before him. Father gently pushed past them and took the injured man's other arm around his shoulders. The three made their way towards the altar as the conscious man babbled incessantly, panic evident in his voice.

Father turned to Giotto and asked him to clear the marble altar of the Bible and the candles, bidding him to be careful with the candles and in fact, G should help him with that. For once, G did not protest Father's request and took one candle while Giotto took the other. Giotto tried not to wince or cry out as the hot wax dripped onto his fingers; he could not complain when another was clearly in more pain than him. G beat him to the Bible, and Giotto watched as he carefully placed it on the floor a safe distance away from the burning candles. It was odd to see G regard Father's beloved book with such care, since Giotto never thought of him as the type, but now was not the time to wonder about such things.

Father and the uninjured man placed his bloody friend upon the altar. Father then clasped his hands in prayer, and the uninjured man clenched his trembling fists on top of the marble by his friend's head.

Giotto bit his lip and asked G again, "What's going on?"

G pursed his lips. "I don't think we should stay here anymore, Giotto."

"What? What do you mean? G, what _happened_?"

Again, G did not respond, instead focusing his attention on Father and the two men. Giotto frowned. He was about to put his foot down and get an answer out of G when he noticed that Father stopped praying and started digging through his pockets. He pulled out a ring and slipped it onto his finger, and within a few seconds, a bright yellow flame emanated from it.

Giotto stared. There was another ring? But the color and shape of the light coming from it was different, and surely Father was not planning on using it on the already injured man! And Giotto could have sworn that Lord Piero said that there were only two of them like the one Lampo had in the world, or had that been his imagination?

He reached into his pocket and grasped the ring he had received from the lord. He had not been able to make anything happen with it, and G had spent many days trying to figure out why. G went back and forth between calling the ring a dud and figuring that there had to be a sort of emotional trigger that the ring reacted to. Now that he saw how Father's ring reacted to his outer calm as opposed to Lampo's ring reacting to his violent tantrum, Giotto wondered if emotion was the key at all. Maybe his ring _wasn't_ a dud?

Father waved his hand over the man's body slowly, his eyes closed and a soft prayer under his breath. Giotto bit his lip. He wanted to protest that he should not use the ring like that, that the man could still be saved, but he had faith that the priest knew what he was doing. Sure enough, as Father's hand swept over the injured man's face, arms, and torso, the wounds vanished as though they had never been there to begin with. The bruises even faded away, leaving his body unmarked except for the trails of blood that had escaped his body.

Though the man did not stir, his friend's eyes watered and he knelt before Father, repeating words that Giotto recognized from G's tutelage, "Spasiba, spasiba balshoye." Thank you, thank you very much.

Father offered a smile and some uncharacteristically soft-spoken words in return. Giotto and G exchanged astounded glances, G's face echoing Giotto's inability to form a proper reaction. They turned back to Father, and Father, noticing their hanging jaws, left the man to weep over his friend's recovery to speak with them.

"I am extremely sorry you saw that," he told the boys. "It is an ugly side of Solntse we were extremely hoping you would not see."

Giotto frowned, confused by Father's words, but then G continued the discussion in Russian before Giotto could ask for clarification. Giotto pursed his lips and clenched his fists, but luckily Father seemed intent on speaking in Italian.

"It is a problem that has always been here, and it is not a problem that will be going away soon. I beg you, do not worry about it, but I also ask that you stay in the church until things settle for your own safety. The, uh, what you call it, mafia? Will never cause trouble in here."

Giotto gaped. "Mafia?"

Again? But they left the mafia behind in Italy! What were they doing here in Solntse, a small town in a country that was too far east to be Italy?

G glared at Father. "We'd be better off leaving Solntse entirely."

Giotto was inclined to agree, but Father shook his head. "No. You will be extremely safe here in the church. And if you left, where would you go? Winter is here and you cannot get anywhere without dying from the cold."

"But—"

"I have no wishes to tell you what you cannot do, but I cannot accept you leaving Solntse until the snow melts, or until a, um, caravana comes through the town. You will die, and I cannot live with myself if I let you doing that. I ask you, trust me. You will be safe here in the church. I promise."

Giotto and G glanced at each other, and an unspoken agreement floated between them.

"Okay, we'll stay," said Giotto. Father smiled appreciatively. "But I wanted to ask you something. That ring…"

He nodded to the ring on Father's finger. Father's grin turned proud, and he curled his hand into a fist and held it up in front of him.

"It is a gift from God," he said. "When I first came to Solntse after taking my vows, I found it in the garden by the walls. I did not know what it could do, but after I found out the mafia, I discovered the secret. It is an extreme miracle."

G snorted. "A gift from God? What a lousy excuse for having a personal possession I thought priests weren't supposed to have."

"And what would you be calling it?" asked Father almost defensively.

"That ring is not as unusual as you might think," said G. "We saw one like it on the outskirts of Italy. It was green and had lightning that killed five kidnappers instead of fire that healed one man, but still. Not so unusual."

Giotto cringed at the way G's words cut through Father and chose not to mention that they had a third one.

"But," said Giotto, hoping to ease the tension, "it's pretty amazing that your ring can do that! How do you get it to work?"

Father smiled.

"I pray," he said. "I pray with all my faith, and God answers my prayers to help the people of Solntse. This is the only thing I can do."

* * *

When Father turned back to tend to the injured man, Giotto and G took their leave and returned to their room. They sat on their respective cots, and Giotto pulled out his ring and held it in the palm of his hand, studying the designs carefully engraved into the metal.

G said, "You didn't tell him about yours."

"Neither did you."

Giotto meant that as a question. He had his own reasons for not mentioning his ring to Father, but he could not fathom G's when he so freely and rudely talked about the first strangely magical ring they saw.

G shrugged. "It wasn't my place."

Now was the time to call him out on it.

"But it was your place to mention Lampo's?" snapped Giotto. When G only looked away, Giotto pressed further. "Why do you hate Father so much? Why do you hate churches so much? You've been worse than when we stayed with Lord Piero since we came here. I don't get it. Father has been nothing but nice to us. And there's nothing bad about the church at all."

G said nothing for a moment, and then, "First of all, Lampo's was worth mentioning because he got his to work. And I'm pretty sure he did it without praying to some nonexistent deity to do it, too. And there's my problem with the church, and with that God. Damn. Priest."

He punctuated each of the last three words with a bile that surprised Giotto. "God clearly doesn't exist. He can't exist. If he did…" He shook his head. "Anyway, we really shouldn't stay here any longer. I know what you said, but I have a feeling he's going to throw us out soon."

Giotto glared at his friend and pocketed his ring.

"He just said that he wouldn't. Didn't you hear him?"

"That was before he heard about what happened," G hissed. "There's more to the story than that coward said, and once he hears it, we're out of here."

"What do you mean? G, seriously, what happened?" Then understanding dawned on Giotto. "Wait. G, what did you _do_?"

"Nothing! I didn't do… I wasn't the one who hurt that man!" G sputtered, his eyes wide and his face red. "In fact, I probably saved that miserable bastard's life! That's the truth, and no one who was there can say otherwise!"

"G!"

G sighed. "Okay, okay. Well, I was walking around the town during Mass, since most people are busy keeling over backwards for every 'extreme' thing that stupid priest has to say, and so it's the only time in the entire town that's actually quiet. It's nice to walk around when there's no one around to feel sorry for you, you know?

"Anyway, I heard something down one of the alleys, so I took a peek to see what was going on, and it was the local mafia picking on those two guys. Beating them up. Saying something about money or whatever. I don't know.

"I thought about walking away. I about damn near did, too, but… I don't know. I just… I just felt like you'd be disappointed in me if you found out that I did, especially when you could have, back in Racale… anyway. I shot my gun. I killed the man doing the most damage to the man. The others saw me, but they ran away, and I know nothing good is going to come from that. They're not Medici—we're a long way away from them now. But I still think they're going to come after me. That's what these types do. If I lay low in the church… but no. They won't care. Especially once Father kicks us out. He told us not to cause trouble and that's exactly what I did."

Giotto took a moment to let everything sink in, realizing that that was the first time G regarded Father with any iota of respect.

"I don't think Father will turn us out, G. It's like you said, you saved that man's life. I don't think it matters how you did it."

"But this is going to come back around. That priest will be a damn fool if he can't see that." G hung his head. "And he's not wrong. We won't survive in the cold. And we can't stay with any of the townspeople because then we'd just be putting them in unnecessary danger. We have to leave Solntse, but we're going to die. A priest's charity doesn't extend far enough to let us wait for a traveler that won't come until spring."

"I don't think he would care, G," said Giotto. "He doesn't seem the type. I think that, when he finds about what you did, he would know that if you hadn't done that, he wouldn't have had to heal that man. He would've been getting ready for his funeral. He's not going to kick us out, G. He's not going to kick _you_ out. If he says we're safe here, we're safe here."

G shook his head. "That's not how this works, Giotto. The _mafia_ is going to come to get me. You saw enough of them in Italy to know. And they won't respect the sanctity of a church. The priest knows that. He has to. Even if he said otherwise. And he can't do anything about them, either. All he has is that ring of his, and even if it could do what that brat's did, I don't think he knows. He's going to be useless to us."

"We have the bullets. You have a gun," Giotto pointed out. "And maybe we'll be able to figure out how this ring works in time to do something good for ourselves, and if there's anything special about our cloaks."

"I don't think the bullets work the way you think they do," said G quietly, repeating what he had said in Lord Piero's mansion. "And the cloaks are probably just junk. Just like the ring."

"I don't care, and the cloaks are probably _not_ —at the very least, they've been keeping us warm—and the ring, well…" Giotto pulled out the ring from his pocket again. "Maybe Lampo's and mine aren't the only two. Maybe Father's and ours aren't the only three, and maybe there are many, many more like it. But I don't think the ring is a dud anymore. I think I'm missing something, but I think I might know what it is. But we're staying, G. And we're going to be _fine_."

G stared at Giotto for a moment, and then he strained a chuckle. "You sound so sure."

"That's because I am," said Giotto, and he did not realize that he completely and undoubtedly believed himself until he said it.


	5. The Sun, Side B

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Notes** : If you've read "With These Fists, I Pray," that back story will pop up in here in Knuckle's own words. If you haven't read it, don't worry; you'll get the gist of it. Knuckle's back story is very loosely based on Natsume Soseki's Kokoro.

Father came to their room the next morning to tell them that the man G brought in was going to be fine, and that he would stay in the church for a little while until they could come up with enough money to cover his debts to the mafia. He also thanked G for saving that man's life and that his friend had told him everything.

"I cannot condone killing to the extreme," he said, but he did not sound disappointed. "But you did an extremely good deed, G."

And so, just like Giotto said, they were allowed to stay with Father in the church, and they were allowed to stay in Solntse until the snow melted. G was still not convinced that they would be completely safe, but Giotto assured him that if the mafia would leave the injured man alone if he stayed here, maybe they would leave them alone, too. From G's silence, Giotto could tell that G did not believe him.

Unfortunately, over the course of the next few days, the mafia respected the sanctity of the church by not barging through its doors to take their charges but instead took their demands out on the other townspeople. First, the man's friend crawled through the doors with both his legs and his right arm broken. Next, an adolescent boy was carried in, unconscious and bleeding profusely and Father barely healed him in time. Then, a young woman, shaken and sobbing uncontrollably and bruised from head to toe, sought comfort in the embrace of the church. She barely spoke a word to anybody, not even to Father.

G's fear that Father would give them to the mafia quickly turned into anger that he did not.

"You know why they're doing this!" he screamed at the priest after he showed the young woman to a room where she could stay for the night. "You know why, and yet you do nothing!"

Father only said solemnly, "This is all I can do. I protect who I can and I heal those I cannot."

"That woman can't be healed with your God ring, you damned idiot!"

"She can be healed with time, love, and God's grace."

G shot Father the nastiest glare he had ever given anyone, and Giotto froze in fear from the look. Then G turned on his heel and returned to their room, slamming the door so loudly that it rang through the entire church. Neither G nor Father clued Giotto in on the damage the mafia inflicted on the woman, but Giotto knew that it was bad enough that they could not stand by and do nothing anymore.

"Father," said Giotto hesitantly, "it's not that we're ungrateful for what you're doing for us. It's just that so many people are getting hurt because of us, and it's not something we ever wanted."

"You and your friend are extremely good people," said Father. "That man you saved is innocent, cold and broke and hungry he had to throw his lot in with the mafia. I will not give any of you to them. Good people are getting hurt, but it is not your fault. You are not the ones hurting them. The mafia is."

"But this isn't going to stop, not until they get what they want."

Father nodded. "And the attacks are worse, I know. But this is all I can do."

When Giotto finally retired to the room he shared with G, he found his friend lying on his bed and trying to burn a hole in the ceiling with his eyes. Giotto had no idea what to say to him. He climbed into his own bed and pulled the covers over himself when G finally spoke.

"We can't keep hiding forever."

"I know."

"But the priest isn't going to do anything."

Giotto sighed.

"What can he do, G? I don't think priests are allowed to fight." G did not respond. Then, Giotto surprised himself by saying, "But we are. And we can."

"Are you suggesting that we face the mafia tomorrow to end this once and for all?"

"I… I think I am."

G smirked. "You read my mind."

The two exchanged proud but scared smiles. Without further discussion, they both fell asleep.

In the morning, the two wordlessly gathered everything they needed for the task: G grabbed his gun and his Family's bullets and after a moment's consideration, his cloak, and Giotto slipped the ring on his finger and the other cloak, Lord Piero's prized possession. G left a note for Father next to their bag of coins and the food that was more than likely molding by now.

"Just in case," he said when Giotto stared at him, breaking the silence.

Side by side, they left their room and into the main hall of the church, but they did not get too far before they saw Father standing at the double doors, facing outside. Giotto heard angry shouting, and with a glance and a nod to G they hurried to the door to see what was going on.

Father did not notice them as they peered from behind him to a group of ten men holding a pregnant woman and five children to the ground, guns to each of their heads. The woman had tears streaming down her face but her sobs were soundless, as opposed to the desperate wails her children screamed. Only one of the men did not hold down the family, and he was the one shouting at Father while waving a gun wildly in the air. A small crowd had gathered to watch the scene, and every pair of eyes were wide in fright.

Father remained poised, but Giotto could tell that his eyes were in conflict and turmoil.

Giotto turned to G and asked, "What's going on?"

G did not look away from the scene before them.

"They want me," he said. "They want me and the man I saved."

He knew it. It was time. G finally met Giotto's glance, and simultaneously they nodded and pushed past Father, revealing themselves to the mafia.

"You—" Father started, but he was cut off by the leader of the group who smirked and smugly spoke to G.

G glared. "If you're true mafia, then you should know Italian, fools. So why don't you try speaking it for your final words?"

The man threw his head back and cackled. "You've got a lot of guts for being just a couple of scrawny brats! Let me lay out the math for you: there are ten of us, and there are two of you. Ten guns, and one. We have hostages, we have leverage, and you have, well, nothing."

"We have me. Aren't I half of what you wanted?"

"That still gives us the upper hand," said the man, "especially since we want you dead. I don't think you want this pretty little mother and her children dead, do you?"

He pulled out his gun and aimed it at Giotto, and all the bravery Giotto had racked up for this moment flooded out of him in a flash.

"Now, tell your precious Father that if we do not see Bolotnikov on the steps of this church in one minute, not only will these poor saps die but so will your friend."

Giotto trembled. This was not going at all the way he hoped it would, and he knew that that the man did not have a single Guinizelli bullet in his gun. He had less than a minute to plan his next move.

He glanced at the ring on his finger, and he wondered if he should not have waited until now to see if his theory on how to make the ring work held true. But, Lampo had wanted to protect his father and Giotto and G when his reacted, and Father had wanted to heal the injured man—Bolotnikov was it?—when his worked. Giotto thought that maybe in the midst of a battle, if he wanted something bad enough, like protecting G, then it would work for him. Didn't Father say something about a resolve?

"Time's up," said the man, and before anyone could say anything to the contrary, a shot rang through the air. Giotto threw his cloak around him and ducked within it. A few more shots were fired, and then Giotto heard a frustrated yell from the man and hushed murmurings of the crowd.

He peered out from over his cloak and saw the man gaping angrily at him. The men behind him and the surrounding crowd all hung their mouths open in shock. Giotto glanced down at the cloak. Could it have been…?

He looked at G, whose shocked expression quickly transformed into a gleeful one.

"Not junk!" he exclaimed. "It really wasn't junk after all!"

Before an elated "See?" could slip past Giotto's mouth, the mafia man turned his attention back to his hostages and his men.

"Kill them! Kill them all! Now!"

But not a single man pulled a trigger before, in a blink of an eye, Father ran to the leader of the mafia and landed a nice, solid punch to his face. The man toppled backwards, unconscious and a small trail of blood leaving his nostril. One dramatic second passed before the other mafia men dropped their hostages and charged at Father with their fists instead of, for some reason, their guns.

Father sidestepped, blocked, and retaliated each of his attackers' messily executed strikes with a flurry of skilled blows to their faces, torsos, and guts. Giotto noticed that Father seemed to be saying something in a steady tempo, "Sto sorok vosem… sto sorok devyat…"

In a brief scramble to remember the language, Giotto realized that 'devyat' was 'nine' but that was all he was able to remember before he saw each man fall one by one to the hard, icy ground, out as cold as their leader.

The children quickly ran into their mother's arms, and she embraced them all as best as she could as she turned to Father and repeated over and over again, "Spasiba, spasiba."

Father, however, paid her little attention. Giotto noticed that his face was somber and his eyes held a world of pain behind them, and he stared at his shaking fists. He muttered something under his breath, something that meant, Giotto would come to learn, "Under three minutes."

* * *

The men of Solntse dragged the unconscious mafia to a stone building on the other side of town, and finally Father snapped out of his reverie to tend to the woman and her children, checking for any wounds. Seeing none, he turned to Giotto, gawking at the lack of any apparent wounds.

"But I was extremely sure that he shot you," he said. Then he murmured what sounded like a prayer.

G stood beside Giotto, and he snarled, "It wasn't God, you idiot. It was that cloak. The thread's probably made out of some sort of metal or something. I didn't think metal was that bulletproof, but…" He shook his head. "That's not the issue right now. Let's talk about you. Where the hell does a priest learn to fight like that?"

Father glanced behind him at the dissipating crowd and then he motioned towards the inside of the church.

"Inside. We will talk about this inside."

He led the boys to his office in the back of the church, further down the hall from their room. The office was modest at best, having little more than a cot, an unlit candle on a small round table beside it, and a desk with a chair on either side and a Bible placed neatly on top. Father waved for Giotto and G to take a seat on the chairs. He leaned against the frosted window on the far side of the room.

"I was not always a priest," Father began.

G snorted. "Yeah. It's pretty obvious no one's born a priest straight from the womb." Giotto shot a glare at G, and he backed down. "Er. Go on."

"I suppose I have never really introduced myself. I do not really remember my name. I grew up on a farm, and my best friend, Dmitry, and I would often box each other. It was a sport we were seeing once while in town and we fell in extreme love with it. One day, one of us hit a girl—we did not mean to—who told us that fighting was wrong, and our parents banned us from boxing ever again.

"We were too in love to quit, so we ran away, and I gave up the name my parents gave me. I went by the nickname the other children of the farms called me. The best translation for it, I think, would be Knuckle. It is a good enough name."

"So," said G slowly, "that's what we're supposed to call you now? None of this 'Father' nonsense?"

"I never asked you to call me that, but you may call me whatever you wish."

G grinned wickedly, and Giotto sighed. Of course G was going to call Father—Knuckle?—the same sorts of bad, insulting things he always had.

If the priest noticed G's rude intentions, he gave no indication and continued.

"We were on the road for many years, stopping in towns and helping the people with whatever they needed help with for food and shelter. In many ways, you extremely remind me of us. We were same age as you, and you are just as close as we were.

"We boxed during our free time, and other children come to watch. When we reached Moscow, adults from a, hm, how is best to say, secret boxing group? Wanted us to join them. We did not, but we thought we were good enough to become professionals. We did not do so good at first, but we got extremely better. We made it to final round, facing each other. It was our dream come true."

Knuckle paused, casting his gaze to his feet. He pursed his lips and crossed his arms across his chest, his eyebrows knitting together.

"There… there was a girl. Irina. We both fell in love with her but she loved Dmitry. He was going to propose marriage to her after the fight, and I lost it. And in the match, I… killed him."

Giotto felt his jaw drop. He killed his best friend because of a girl? But Giotto knew that because he had never been in love before, he could not understand the feeling. Still, he could not imagine hurting G for a reason like that.

"But it was an accident," said Giotto. Because surely Knuckle had not meant to!

He closed his eyes. "I do not know. I am regretting it, and I never made choice to do that, but I do not know. But that was when I decided to become a priest. I gave up fighting and decided to give my life to God because I let my selfish self commit the worst sin."

"There are worse sins, Father," said G quietly. Giotto quickly glanced at his friend, and he could not figure out the solemn expression, much like he could not interpret the words G spoke or the way he said them.

Knuckle sighed. "Does it matter? I know what I did, and I will repent for the rest of my life. I gave up boxing. I gave up fighting. Once I gave myself to this, that was when I found this ring."

He held up his fist, his middle finger adorning the ring. "When I found what it can do, I knew God was going to be helping me. I know better than to ignore a sign from God. Will it still work now that I have broken my vow?"

He stared at his fist as though he expected the ring to flare in the same bright yellow light from before, but it did not.

"I figure," he said dejectedly.

Giotto knew that Knuckle needed some reassurance, even if he was the wrong person to give it.

"I don't know too much about God or the Bible or anything," he started. "I attend all your sermons but I only understand little of what you say. But I don't think God would punish you for breaking your promise not to fight anymore. You didn't kill those people. You saved that mother and her children, and me, and G, and everyone. You fought to protect. I think even God can forgive you for that. And as for the ring—"

He thrust out his hand towards the priest. "I have one like it. And like G said before, we saw another one back in Italy. Lampo. His ring reacted when he wanted to protect his father and us from these bad men trying to kidnap him. I haven't been able to get mine to work yet, but I think it's because I don't have the right resolve yet. And maybe yours isn't working right now because you don't have the same resolve you do when you want to heal someone."

Knuckle pulled himself from the window and grabbed Giotto's hand, staring at his ring intently. Giotto noticed that the priest's hands were not soft at all, but rough, like he supposed a boxer's hands would have to be as opposed to those of a priest's. He was also not gentle with Giotto, squeezing just a little too tight and being just a little too forceful in his movements.

Knuckle brought his other hand, the one with the ring, to Giotto's, and he inhaled sharply.

"This is…" he murmured, and then Giotto could not understand his words anymore. Then he met Giotto's eyes, and finally, the priest smiled. "I think this means I am to be going with you. This is an extreme sign from God. It must be."


	6. The Rain, Side A

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Giotto and G progress to be about 12 years old when they reach Japan; Knuckle is 21 years old. Ugetsu is about 15 years old. The time period is loosely based on the Muromachi, when the Portuguese first arrived in Kyushu; I know Ugetsu's attire is from the Heian but in the Muromachi some nobility still wore those kinds of outfits. Also, the math simply does not add up if I based the fic during the Heian, which ended in 1195. I'll admit that Muromachi is still stretching it, but given what was going on in that time period, it works best with the nature of this fic. That being said, please give me a heads-up about any historical inaccuracies.

G spent the rest of the winter arguing with Knuckle over his decision to accompany them out east. In the midst of trying to convince Knuckle to stay put in Solntse, G revealed just about everything about them, to Giotto's surprise: that G was once heir to a powerful mafia Family, that they weren't actually visiting their sick grandmother but fleeing a Family that wiped out G's, that they carried special bullets that had mysterious powers, and so on. None of this deterred Knuckle from his decision.

"It is God's will," he said over and over again, causing G to roll his eyes and stomp away. Sometimes, if they had the discussion right after Knuckle finished Mass, he screamed it instead with an added, "To the extreme!"

Giotto and G froze from the volume and intensity of his conviction. Giotto was used to him giving his sermons in that manner, but to hear it during a normal conversation was something he was convinced he would never grow accustomed to.

Finally, the last of the snow melted, and a Portuguese caravan passed through Solntse. Knuckle arranged for the boys and himself to travel with them for a nominal fee. After bidding the townspeople a long and loud farewell, Knuckle and the two boys continued their adventure in the company of adventurers and traders.

Again, G helped Giotto learn their language, which Giotto found he had an easier time with than with Russian. Awed by G's grasp of the many languages they had encountered so far, Giotto finally asked him about it while they sat around a small campfire as the caravan settled for the night.

"My father made sure that I was properly educated," said G. "So he had me learn Latin, German, English, and Russian. I taught myself Portuguese, because out of everything that nanny was teaching me, languages were the only things I actually liked. Good thing too; it's helped us out a lot so far. What I'm curious about is: how the hell does that God damned stupid priest know _Portuguese_?"

He glared at Knuckle, who faithfully had his Bible open. He smiled as he glanced up, not shutting the book.

"That was not the first time they come through Solntse. I only was in the town for a year, and in that year I saw them about dozen times. One of the townspeople helped me learn it so that I could talk and help them."

"Well," said G, crossing his arms, "your Portuguese is sloppier than your Italian. So don't get too cocky."

Knuckle, as usual, did not take the bait and instead returned to his reading, much to G's infuriation. To calm his friend down, Giotto asked him to teach him more. Fortunately, G readily obliged.

By the time the summer months came and they arrived in the exotic land the Portuguese called China, Giotto finally had enough of a grasp of the language that he managed to hold a good number of conversations with the explorers. Most of these conversations were with Fernão, the leader of the caravan. He offered simple but informative explanations to Giotto about the lands they passed through and their legends, their people, and their cultures. He even told Giotto (and G, who pretended not to listen) some of the basics of the language.

"To say hello, you say ni hao," Fernão explained. "Xìe xìe is thank you."

Giotto flubbed every pronunciation Fernão threw at him, though he was certain he said exactly what the explorer told him. Despite Fernão's patience and reassurances that the language was far from easy, Giotto grew increasingly discouraged. Finally, Fernão asked Giotto where his final destination was. If it was indeed China, he could understand the frustration, but if not, they could just skip ahead to the language of wherever they were headed.

Giotto blushed and stared at the ground.

"We're just heading east. My grandmother once told me about a land of beginnings, a land where destinies begin, because that is where the sun rises. I know it sounds stupid, and it probably doesn't really exist, but—"

"The Land of the Rising Sun? You mean Japan?"

Giotto snapped his head up and gaped at Fernão. "You mean, it really does exist?"

Fernão nodded with an ecstatic twinkle in his eye.

"That's exactly where we're heading, boy! This is my second trip there. It's as far east as you can go, and the people there are something else. The language is a little easier to get a grasp on, and I can help you get a head start on a few things. I must say, I admire your sense of adventure! Heading for a land you didn't even know existed, why, you're a natural born explorer, aren't you?"

"I… I guess so," said Giotto weakly as Fernão launched into another one of his lectures about culture.

Though Giotto could never bring himself to admit to Fernão why they were going so far east, with every starry eyed word the man spoke, Giotto found himself growing more and more excited about his final destination.

* * *

After many weeks' delay due to trades and diplomacy and some time at sea, they reached the port city of Nagasaki. Fernão bid the three farewell, promising them that he would remain in Japan through the cherry blossom season if they ever wanted to accompany him back to Europe. They could, of course, leave whenever they pleased, for ships left the harbor at least twice a month, but they should at least see the blossoms once before they left. As a parting gift, he exchanged their Italian and Russian coins for Japanese ones and directed them to a selection of different inns that were very friendly to foreigners, giving them one last reminder about the social customs of the land.

"Bow, do not shake hands. Always be very, very polite. And never directly say 'no.'"

Then Fernão left to go about his business in the city, leaving Giotto, G, and Knuckle inhaling the overwhelming stench of freshly caught fish and staring at the bustling streets and a wealth of men, women, and children dressed as flamboyantly different as the Chinese. Many of the women wore simple robes tied together with a short, thin apron wrapped around their waists. The men, instead of aprons around their waists, wore long and flowing pants that hiked up halfway up their torsos, and each of them either wore their hair in tight buns on top of their heads or tucked within funny-looking hats. Some people had geometric or floral patterns on their robes, but many kept theirs plain and drab.

Giotto thought that after the extravagant displays of silk the people of Beijing wore around the city, he would have been quite used to feeling like an outsider with his simple white shirt and dark blue trousers. But without Fernão and the explorers and traders around, he felt like he stuck out like a sore thumb more than he had in China, even with a similarly dressed G to his right and a conspicuously dressed priest to his left. He tugged at his shirt and wondered if Fernão gave them enough money to try and buy clothes to match the others in town.

"So, what should we do now?" asked G. "Go check out those inns, look around the town, buy some food…?"

"I extremely think we should try to secure lodging," said Knuckle. Giotto still marveled at how the priest's Italian had improved over the past few months, especially given that they had been in the company of the Portuguese the entire time. "At least so we can have some place to put our things."

"No," G spat. "The bullets, the rings, the cloaks… they stay with us at all times."

"You want to carry the bullets and the cloaks? It's not cold enough to wear those, and the bullets—"

"They haven't left my side the past couple of years, and they're not about to start now," said G. "Same with my gun. And at least Giotto's cloak is too valuable to let go, and who knows what kind of trouble we're going to run into around here. And you can just keep your ring in your pocket."

"But maybe, at the very least, we should try to find one of the inns Fernão told us about," Giotto piped up, ghosting his hand over his empty pocket. G spent the morning wondering if he would have any luck igniting the ring but to no avail. He probably would have given it back to Giotto had they not docked earlier than Fernão anticipated. "We don't have to drop off our things in the room, but maybe we should find someplace to stay before all the rooms are gone? I mean, the ship was pretty full."

G considered this for a moment. "Okay, fine. I guess it would be better to go when we're wide awake and they can't take advantage of us."

And so, following Fernão's instructions, they made their way into the heart of Nagasaki. The smell of fish was quickly replaced by a swirling scent of strange sweets and cooked meat in exotic spices and seasonings. Giotto's belly rumbled, and he sighed. The time at sea had not been kind to his stomach. But neither G nor Knuckle complained about being hungry, so he knew he had to keep it together, at least until they found a place to stay.

After gently—or not so, given G's and Knuckle's natures, despite Knuckle's best efforts—pushing past the curious, cautious stares of the people, they finally reached a less crowded back road on what looked to be the inland edge of the city. A river ran alongside the dirt road the met perpendicular to the city streets, and the only people around looked to be the less extravagantly dressed, moving with a greater sense of purpose than the ones in the city. Fewer buildings lined the other side of the river, replaced by browning meadows and orange trees.

G wrinkled his nose. "Fucking idiot priest, we should've turned somewhere."

"No, I'm extremely sure this is where Gospodin Fernão wanted us to go," said Knuckle thoughtfully. "Go straight all the way to the river—"

"Your Portuguese is still awful! He said, go straight _towards_ the river, then take a right—"

Before Giotto could nudge into the middle of their argument yet again, he heard a piercing shriek and frantic splashing of water upstream. He snapped his attention to the source and saw a young girl, perhaps about his own age, thrashing her arms about and screaming words that Fernão never taught him. Many of the townspeople stopped in mid-stride and gaped and pointed, and in the far distance Giotto noticed two boys not too much older than them but dressed entirely differently than the others running towards her.

Giotto realized no one was planning on going in after the girl, and he knew he could not just stand by as she drowned. Leaving behind a bewildered G yelling after him, Giotto darted up the river towards the girl. When he reached the closest point he could to her, he hopped in. At first, he gasped because of the piercing cold. Then he realized that he did had no idea what to do once his feet could not touch the floor of the riverbed, and he soon found himself in the same predicament as the girl.

Not knowing what else to do, he screamed, "G!" while wildly flailing his arms and legs. He never did wander past his waistline when he played in the creek and streams in Italy. And now, he regretted it, because while he was sure G could reach him in time that still left that poor girl with nowhere else to go but under.

"G!" he yelled again.

Before he could tell him to save the girl instead, he felt a sharp pang in the middle of his forehead. Then his entire being overflowed with all his final thoughts, all his final regrets: about how he should have learned to swim so that he could have saved that girl, so that he could survive this, because after so many months and so many hardships they were finally here. Here, in the land where destinies were born. The land of beginnings. The Land of the Rising Sun, Fernão called it. If only he had learn to swim!

Then he felt the familiar burning sensation on his head, in his eyes, and he found himself moving his arms and his legs in a furiously controlled manner. He was swimming! He was swimming, and now he could save that girl, and they would both live and it would not have all been for naught.

Giotto pedaled himself towards the floundering girl. In one fell swoop he took her under his right arm and used his left and his legs to drive them to the riverside.

The moment his skin hit dry dirt, the world became clearer, and he sneezed and shivered. Drawing his limbs into himself, he was vaguely aware that he was, like the time in Racale, naked, but he could not bring himself to be too self-conscious about it. G had really done it; he had shot him with a Guinizelli bullet, and he had saved this girl!

Girl.

 _Girl._

Who he was naked in front of.

 _Where was G and that stupid cloak!_

If he could have held himself tighter, he would have. He shut his eyes, not bearing to see how the girl or the other townspeople reacted to the sight. It was one thing to be like this in front of G and a bunch of unconscious mafia men; it was another in front of a _girl_ and a staring public where he already stood out for having blonde hair instead of black!

Giotto felt a warm, soft cloth fall around his shoulders. He gripped it and pulled it around himself, daring to open his eyes to see the familiar black fabric and multi-colored jewels. G stood above him with a face crossed between relief and panic, and Giotto smiled at him in thanks.

"You really are a special kind of idiot, aren't you?" he said softly.

"That was extremely incredible, Giotto!" Knuckle exclaimed loudly in his sermon voice behind them. Giotto cringed. Now they certainly had the attention of the entire street. "You had me worried there for a moment, but you were incredible, to the extreme! Is it an Italian thing with the fire? Is losing the clothes an Italian thing?"

"No, it's not an Italian thing," said Giotto, wondering if Knuckle had completely missed G pulling out his gun. G had told Knuckle about the bullets, after all; but at the time, Giotto remembered, Knuckle still struggled with their language, and G had had little interest repeating himself in Russian. He probably only understood that the bullets were important, somehow.

Before Giotto could repeat G's explanation to the priest, the two boys running up to the girl before finally reached them. The girl, wearing green butterfly robes made of silk, scrambled to her feet and clutched onto the shorter of the two. He embraced her, speaking so fast that Giotto could not pick out a single word he said. The girl wailed into his robes, also made of silk, but his were dominantly white, with puffy blue pants beneath. The strange hat on his head was similar to the others in town, but taller. His dark eyes were soft and kind and seemed to hold a world of laughter in them, and his smile was gentle.

The taller boy behind him was obviously a few years older, and though many of their features were similar, his face was contorted into a scowl that could rival G's. He wrinkled his nose in disdain at Giotto. He then glared at the girl and said something sharply, and the girl pulled away from the younger boy with her head down.

"Sumimasen deshita, Ani-ue," she murmured. Giotto only picked up the first half of it—she was sorry?

The younger boy gave his companion a weak grin that Giotto supposed was as close to a glare as he could get. He then turned his attention to Giotto and the others and bowed.

"Arigatou de gozaru," he said, and then he said some more that Giotto could not decipher.

Giotto glanced at G for any hope of translation, and G returned the gaze with a hopeless shrug. "I think he said thanks."

"I understood that part."

Then the boy laughed. G's face colored, and Giotto was certain his did as well. Then the boy said something more, and the one behind him snapped at him. They conversed briefly, before the older of the two stormed off, dragging the girl by the arm. The younger one turned back to Giotto and G and Knuckle, smiling as brightly as ever, and he pointed at himself and said, "Asari Ugetsu."

None of the three of them said a word. Giotto shrugged. The boy repeated himself, still smiling and still pointing at his face, before it dawned on Giotto.

"Oh! Um…" He mirrored Asari Ugetsu's movements. "Giotto Vongola." Then he pointed at his companions respectively. "G. Knuckle."

"Giotto… Bongore?"

Giotto laughed uncertainly. "Just Giotto is fine. Um, Giotto."

"Giotto," said Asari Ugetsu with a grin. He turned to the others. "G… Nakkuru?"

"Knuckle," G snapped.

"Nakkuru."

G opened his mouth but was interrupted by the priest.

"It is close enough," he said. "I think it might be a, um... a part of their language."

"If you say so, God Lover. So you're… Asari Ugetsu?"

The Japanese boy nodded. "Demo, Ugetsu dake de wa ii de gozaru. Ugetsu."

"Ugetsu," said G firmly, and Ugetsu nodded, his smile never wavering. G studied the boy's face for a moment, repeating his name over and over again slowly. Then he turned to Giotto and said, "I think he said it's okay if we just call him Ugetsu."

* * *

After a whirlwind of hand gestures and each side slowly speaking Japanese with Giotto, G, and Knuckle spectacularly butchering the language, they found themselves in Ugetsu's home, sitting on thin, soft cushions in front of short trays with an exotic rainbow of food before them. Knuckle acclimatized himself to the polite atmosphere of the room as though he was born to it, but Giotto and G shifted uncomfortably on their knees and snuck wary glances at each other. Fernão taught them all the proper manners, promising them that they would find themselves in a situation like this, but Giotto had a feeling that Fernão never dreamed that they would find themselves in a situation like _this_.

Ugetsu had awkwardly introduced his family to them using the same method as by the river. Through careful recollection of Fernão's tutelage and an embarrassing assumption of what parts of the introduction were actually names, Giotto realized that they now dined in an awful silence with Ugetsu's mother, older brother, and younger sister.

His younger sister, Fuku, was the one he had saved by the river, and now she dressed in a different set of robes. Purple this time, with pink flowers dotting the bottom and pink lining at the seams of her sleeves. She wore her black hair long and flowing down her back, and she kept her dark eyes down at her own food, though Giotto noticed that she stole quick peeks at him every once in a while. Whenever she did, he quickly looked away, embarrassed that she had likely seen him naked earlier.

The taller boy from before was Ujizane, Ugetsu's older brother. He dressed similarly to his younger brother, and if not for his perpetual scowl, Giotto could see the resemblance between the two. He, like Fuku, barely spoke a word during the meal, his narrowed eyes directed at Giotto instead. Giotto made it a point not to look at Ujizane longer than necessary.

Between the wrinkles on her porcelain face, her kind smiles and soft laughter, and how she filled the room with seemingly polite conversation, Tokuhime was easily Ugetsu's mother in every way Giotto could imagine a mother being like her son. Like her daughter, she wore her hair straight and long. Her robes were red with golden leaves outlined across and green lined the edges where the cloth ended. She kept grinning at her guests and at her children as she spoke, though Giotto and Knuckle could only offer her unsure smiles while G clearly looked like he wanted to be anywhere but here. Ugetsu mirrored his mother, and Fuku kept her eyes on her food and Ujizane only kept glaring.

The dinner conversation was kept mostly between Ugetsu and his mother, though every once in a while Giotto or Knuckle would attempt to respond to them. The attempt always failed as both Ugetsu and Tokuhime stared blankly at them. Once, G tried his hand, and though he lasted longer than either Giotto or Knuckle he, too, eventually gave up in frustration, his cheeks turning as red as his hair.

Finally, the agonizing dinner ended. Giotto and Knuckle remembered to bow in appreciation to Ugetsu's family. G first only nodded until Giotto elbowed him into following suit. The stars now twinkled in the sky, and Giotto worried that they would not get to any of the inns Fernão suggested when Ugetsu waved at them to follow him.

He led them around just outside of the house, on a sort of wooden veranda that circled the paper doors into the rest of the house. He chatted at them incessantly, though none of the three of them could understand a word he said. G opened his mouth as though to tell Ugetsu that they didn't understand him, but he soon shut it again, unsettled. Giotto offered his friend a knowing grin; out of all the useful phrases Fernão taught them, he could have at least taught them one to gently remind someone that they did not know their language.

Soon, Ugetsu stopped and slid open the door before him. Three bedrolls were already laid out with blankets and pillows. Ugetsu gently ushered them inside, and the three glanced at each other warily.

"Um, I guess this means we can stay the night here?" said Giotto.

"This is extremely convenient," said Knuckle with a grin. "We can save up our money for something else. Clothes for Giotto, maybe?"

He nodded at the makeshift pants G had fashioned for Giotto out of his own cloak, Giotto's being used to wrap around his torso.

G snorted. "Yeah, right. We're going to have to find an inn tomorrow, and Giotto's right: the rooms might all be taken by then. Which means we'll probably get ripped off since we obviously still don't know the language."

"I'm sure we'll be fine, G," said Giotto. "Maybe Ugetsu can help us out…?"

He looked at Ugetsu, who kept smiling. Giotto sighed. Or maybe not, since they had no idea where to begin asking him.

Ugetsu brushed past the three and grabbed one of the pillows, holding it up to them.

He slowly said something, ending the phrase in an upturn, questioning tone. At their blank stares, he repeated it, before he finally said, "Makura." He pointed at a bedroll. "Futon." Then he pointed at his hat. "Eboshi."

G was the first to understand, and he approached Ugetsu and grabbed the pillow from his hands.

"Pillow," he said, and then he nodded at the bedroll and his hat and named the objects in Italian. Ugetsu repeated everything he said, and though Ugetsu's pronunciation was terrible, G surprisingly did not lash out at him. For the rest of the night, the four of them continued on, all eagerly getting a grasp on each other's language.

* * *

The next morning, they awoke to a pile of neatly folded dark blue robes by their bedrolls. G and Knuckle immediately launched into an argument over whether or not to put them on.

"We're leaving soon anyway," said G. "I don't know why you're making a big deal out of this."

"Even so, you should try to fit in," said Knuckle. "And it would be polite to our hosts from last night, and I think the innkeeper wherever we stay would extremely appreciate it."

"We're going to stand out anyway! Giotto and I don't exactly have black hair, and you're entirely too tall!" A beat. "Wait, ' _you_ ' should try to fit in? Not 'we?' As in, me and Giotto but not you? Are you trying to tell us to wear these but you have no intentions to?"

Knuckle waved at the cassock on his body. "This is all I am permitted to wear. Gospodin Fernão told me there were enough missionaries around that this would not be a problem."

"And there are plenty of Portuguese in the city that Giotto and I can get away wearing what we have," G snapped. Then he looked at Giotto and the two cloaks he wore to remain decent in the house of strangers, and he amended his statement. "Giotto, maybe you should wear the clothes, at least."

Giotto had not been able to get a word in to point out just that. Knuckle was right, of course—they really ought to try to fit in as much as possible—but the bigger issue was that Giotto had no clothes aside from the cloaks Lord Piero had given him and G, so he really had no choice. Besides, at least these clothes were at absolutely no cost, freeing up their coin for any inn fees and food.

So he nodded and reached for the robes. "I think you should wear them too, G. Like Father said, just to be polite."

G wrinkled his nose. "But his 'Extreme' Holiness doesn't have to wear them?"

"I don't think priests are allowed to wear anything but that. Right?" He looked to Knuckle, who nodded with an appreciative smile. "We'll try to explain it to Ugetsu as best as we can. Here, can you help me figure this out?"

As Giotto wriggled out of the makeshift pants and pulled his own cloak off of his shoulders, G unceremoniously unfolded the robes and studied them.

"It looks simple enough. I think you just put this on like a shirt or something." The interior door slid open. "Or maybe Ugetsu can help us—"

G stopped short. Giotto glanced at the doorway and saw why. There knelt Fuku, face bright red and her eyes wide. Giotto was, once again, completely bare naked in front of her.

Before he could react, she pushed away from the door and fled, saying behind her in frantic Japanese, "Excuse me, I am so very sorry!"

Giotto felt his entire body burn up, and not in the same way the Guinizelli bullets often left him. He wished that bullets had something to do with it, if only because he wished he were dead at that moment. G offered no words in comfort, but at least he was better than Knuckle, who threw his head back and laughed.

"Italians are truly the best lovers, to the extreme!" he exclaimed.

* * *

After the debacle with the robes, the three of them sought out Ugetsu to thank him for the hospitality. A strange melody whistled through the air of the garden just outside their room, and Giotto's curiosity won out over G's insistence that they find the boy to get out of here as quickly as possible.

They followed the music around the perimeter of the house, locating the source in a room to the far back of the grounds of the Asari home. The paper door was wide open, leaving no detail of the room to the imagination: the straw mats that had also lined the floors of the guest room, the sliding doors that made up three of the four walls of the room, the fourth wall being made of solid wood, and on that solid wall, a simple, vertical scroll depicting a green countryside in the middle of a rainstorm hung dutifully underneath a horizontal one with beautifully exquisite scribbles. In the middle of the room, kneeling upon a square cushion, was Ugetsu blowing into a wooden flute, exactly where the beautiful notes floated from.

Neither Giotto, G, nor Knuckle dared to breathe as they stood at the door, listening to the mysterious song Ugetsu played. Giotto could not decide if he was more entranced by the music or by Ugetsu's aura, which was so blindingly different than his cheerfully polite smiles from the night before. He was intensely passionate, much like Knuckle when he gave his sermons except focused within himself, and Giotto felt as though he could hear the boy's soul with each note he played. Something about it was melancholy yet hopeful, carefree yet mature.

The song faded away, and Ugetsu lowered the flute and turned to see the three of them gawking at him. Giotto felt his face flush. This certainly could not be polite!

"Um, uh… excuse us…?" he offered weakly in Japanese.

Ugetsu gently laughed and waved his hand, a gesture Giotto now knew to mean that he wanted them to come to him, or to follow him, or whatever the occasion suggested. He glanced at G and Knuckle, and they shrugged and kicked off their shoes to join Ugetsu in his room.

"Sleep good?" asked Ugetsu in broken Italian. "Bed, ah… soft?"

Giotto nodded. "Yes. Er. That is," he continued in Japanese, "thank you."

Ugetsu shook his head. "No, no. No Japanese. Italian. Please?"

Giotto did not know how to respond, so he just nodded. G, on the other hand, did.

"But we're here in Japan for a while. We should use Japanese. There's no reason for you to know Italian." When Ugetsu's expression did not change, G sighed and tried again in a sloppy mix of both languages.

Somehow, Ugetsu understood. "But your Italian… beautiful. Please?"

Giotto was surprised by the vocabulary and grasp of grammar Ugetsu picked up overnight. Giotto wondered how late Ugetsu had stayed after he slid away to sleep; the last things Giotto heard was him and G and Knuckle still going at the word and phrase exchange.

G seemed less impressed, but he dropped his shoulders and sighed.

"How about we speak in both languages then. Japanese and Italian." Then he scrunched his face. "Wait a minute, it's not like we're staying here in this house that much longer. Fine, Italian then. Where can we find an inn?"

"Inn…?"

"A place to sleep."

Ugetsu smiled brighter. "Here! My house."

"No, not your house! Your house is not an inn," G snapped. "There are other guests. Lots of others. Like us. Not Japanese. But here in Nagasaki. Ah, hell." He threw his hands up.

Giotto was not surprised that G's patience had finally worn thin. He had wondered how long it would take for G to start yelling at Ugetsu. But to Giotto's surprise, Ugetsu did not seem offended by the outburst, his grin never fading.

"You stay here," he said. "Haha-ue… Mother said too. Fuku-chan like you staying here, Giotto-dono. I like you staying here. And G-dono and Nakkuru-dono too. No inn. Inn need money."

Giotto took a moment to let Ugetsu's offer and the mention of his sister wanting him to stay sink in. He knew his cheeks were tinged pink when he finally collected himself to say, "You're letting us stay here? For free?"

"We don't need the charity," said G, repeating the same words he had said to Knuckle in Solntse but with far less fervor. At the question mark on Ugetsu's face, G did not even bother explaining his protest.

Knuckle bowed.

"We extremely thank you, Ugetsu," he said. "This is an extreme kindness you are showing."

Ugetsu laughed. "No, no, the kindness is you. You save Fuku-chan. This is least we do for you."


	7. The Rain, Side B

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For this chapter, I'm playing with the idea that stories and history often changes in the retelling: the spirit of what we were given in-canon is still the same, but the exact details are different. And don't worry, what's discussed in this chapter between Giotto and G will not negate Cozart's influence as seen in Chapter 313.

As the leaves fell off the trees, the Asari clan befriended their European guests with enthusiastic kindness, Ujizane notwithstanding. Every morning, a fresh set of kimono waited for them, though over the weeks the servants of the house learned not to set one aside for Knuckle. They then wandered to Ugetsu's room to listen to him perform his morning tunes, and together the four walked to the main room for breakfast. There, Tokuhime, Ujizane, and Fuku waited for them. Ujizane always barked at them for keeping everybody waiting, but after a while, Giotto, G, and Knuckle learned not to pay any attention to him, but not before G felt comfortable enough in Japanese to respond back.

Giotto wanted to forget how purple Ujizane's face had turned when he reached for his sword, only to be stopped by Ugetsu pleading for his brother to calm down.

"Now, now," he had said gently. "G-dono didn't mean it, Ani-ue."

"Like hell I didn't. Pompous prick," G had muttered, thankfully in Italian.

Ever since then, breakfast continued without incident. Everyone enjoyed polite conversation and delicious food. Once the trays were cleared away, the three Asari children and their mother disappeared until the afternoon, leaving Giotto, G, and Knuckle free to explore the city of Nagasaki. Knuckle often visited a recently erected church while Giotto and G adventured around town, taking in the sights and visiting structures that did not exist anywhere in Europe.

Sometimes, Ugetsu had a free morning and accompanied them, pointing out places of interest and urging them to try food that Ujizane never allowed in their home. He told them stories of his family, about how Ujizane was not always so mean, that when their father passed away Ujizane had to take over and something about the way politics were going meant that Ujizane was always exhausted and on edge.

"I don't know too much about it myself," said Ugetsu in surprisingly good Italian for only learning it in a few weeks. "But that's why I'm not the eldest."

"That is _not_ why you're not the eldest," said G, rolling his eyes. "That's not how birth order works."

Ugetsu laughed and changed the subject to any of the many other things he would go on about, slipping in between Italian and Japanese whenever he stumbled upon a phrase or a word G could not help translate.

Every once in a while, Fuku would be allowed to accompany them, though she rarely spoke a word. Ugetsu tried his best to include her in their conversation, but she kept her eyes to the ground, peering every so often at Giotto. Sometimes Giotto even tried asking her a question or two, but she gave simple answers with a deep blush.

Giotto had long since gotten over his initial embarrassment every time he saw Ugetsu's younger sister ever since Ugetsu told him that Fuku was fascinated by him. "You saved her life, after all," he pointed out after telling Giotto why Fuku had been out in the river in the first place. The wind had taken away her handkerchief, he said, a handkerchief from Kyoto that their father brought back for her just before he died. Ugetsu joked about how it must have been fate, because now they were all really good friends.

Now Giotto found himself growing more and more curious about Fuku, and whenever she could get away from whatever studies or chores or duties she had to perform, she always sought him out and he always welcomed her company, regardless of who was with him and what time of day it was. But it was only when they were alone, without G or Knuckle or Ugetsu, that Fuku said more than a couple of words at a time. She giggled, and she smiled more openly. Giotto quickly realized that he looked forward to alone time with her.

Sometime after midday, the group returned to the Asari household. Regardless of Ugetsu's availability in the morning, he spent the rest of the afternoon practicing his flute. G always sat right outside his room to listen or nap. If Knuckle did not leave the church and Fuku was too busy to be with Giotto, they joined him.

On one such afternoon, Giotto joined his best friend underneath the barren tree beside Ugetsu's room. G scooted over so that Giotto could have some of the trunk to lean against, a smoking cigarette hanging from his mouth. For a while they sat in companionable silence, enjoying the trills and smooth notes from Ugetsu's flute.

Finally, G said just under the music, "That girl's busy today?"

Giotto nodded. "She said something about needing to practice her calligraphy. She teaches me sometimes, after dinner, when you and Knuckle are with Ugetsu."

G snorted. "Sounds far more interesting than my evenings. Those two are always going on and on about nonsense. Gives me a headache."

"You can join me and Fuku if you want."

To Giotto's relief, G declined, but his reasoning made Giotto's face flush. "No, I don't want to interfere with you two lovebirds."

"Wh—what?"

G smirked. "You like her. Even our resident God idiot noticed."

"I—no! I mean, I do like her, but—"

"We think she likes you, too."

"I… you do?"

G laughed, a sound that Giotto was not accustomed to hearing. The music from Ugetsu's room stopped briefly before picking up again, and Giotto wondered if Ugetsu had heard everything. Oh, this was the worst.

"It's not like that," said Giotto helplessly. "I mean, she _is_ cute, and nice, and there's no reason not to like her, but… I mean…" G smiled, clearly unconvinced. "Oh, shut up, G."

"It's okay, Giotto," said G, relaxing against the tree trunk and closing his eyes. "I know how you feel."

Giotto frowned, unsure of what G meant but thought better of prying. They listened to the end of the tune, indicated by a prolonged pause at the end of the last note. Giotto almost expected Ugetsu to join them, but he instead launched into another piece, livelier than the last. G pulled away the cigarette and sighed, a small cloud of tobacco escaping from his mouth.

"Since when did you start smoking?" asked Giotto. Many of the Portuguese they had traveled with engaged in the habit, but this was the first time he had seen G do it. Had he been smoking all this time?

G shrugged. "A couple of weeks ago, when you and Fuku were out on the harbor. Ugetsu wanted to visit the church, and we ran into a few explorers and traders who were selling this stuff. The Father thought they were bothersome, so…"

Giotto sighed. "Of course you did. And Ugetsu doesn't mind?"

"He thought it was funny."

"And now?"

A pause. "He listens too much to the fucking priest. This is harmless."

Giotto offered G a grin and moved on. "I was thinking, G, about the cherry blossom season. Fuku said it wouldn't happen for another couple of months at least, but I was wondering… did you want to go back with Fernão? I only ask because, well, I don't know if I'd be ready to leave in a couple of months. I mean, we all seem so much happier here, and we're far away from the Medici now. If that man was ever going to find us, he would have by now, don't you think? Besides, it's like Fernão said. We can't go much more east than here."

"Are you saying you want to stay?"

"I know we can't impose on Ugetsu's family forever. Maybe they can help us find work or something. I don't know if that's how it works here, but it'd be a start. I don't know, G. What do you think?"

G said nothing at first, taking another drag from his cigarette and glancing in the direction of Ugetsu's room. After a moment's consideration, he smiled.

"I never really had any intentions of going back to Italy, anyway. We'll figure something out. But yeah. Let's stay."

* * *

Knuckle seemed perplexed by the boys' decision.

"But I extremely thought that was the point of coming all the way out here," he said. Clearly, he never had any intentions of returning to Solntse, either.

And so it was decided, though they agreed to hold off telling Ugetsu and his family until the spring. Though they could certainly help the three find a way to survive without their assistance, they wanted to try their luck on their own first and get a more solid feel for the culture and what opportunities they had.

Knuckle determined that being a missionary was the path for him, though he was loath to separate from Giotto and G. There were plenty of missionaries in Nagasaki already, he said, but he knew that neither of them wanted to leave the city, either. He would make do somehow.

Actually keeping the news from Ugetsu and his family proved to be difficult. The topic of conversation at dinner anymore became Ujizane demanding to know when they would be rid of their guests with Tokuhime reprimanding him to be polite while kindly asking the three of them how much longer they were planning on staying in Nagasaki. While they gave Tokuhime and Ujizane vague answers, Ugetsu and Fuku continued the discussion after the meal or in the mornings while in the city. Unlike their older brother and mother, they seemed more distraught at the thought that Giotto, G, and Knuckle would return home someday soon.

"You won't be going home until at least you see the cherry blossoms, right?" Fuku pleaded in Japanese. She never grasped onto Italian as easily as her brother had. "They're very beautiful."

"Fernão said the same thing," said Giotto, dodging a fisherman carrying a net of fish too big to have noticed him. "But we'll stay at least that long. Maybe even longer."

"And then you'll go home," said Fuku. "Back to Italy. Ugetsu-ani-ue will be very sad. So will I," she amended softly.

Giotto cringed. What was the best way to tell her they were staying without actually telling her? He hated to hear her so melancholy.

"Well, actually, we were thinking about maybe—definitely staying a _lot_ longer than after the cherry blossoms bloom. If they're as beautiful as everyone says, we were thinking about seeing them bloom more than just this year." That was certainly a clumsy way of putting it. "But! We don't want to… that is, your family has been so kind to us. We don't want to trouble you much longer."

"Oh, no, it's no trouble! Please don't mind Ujizane-ani-ue. He's just always so busy and so tired, but I think he really does like you and G-dono and Nakkuru-dono. He will let you stay with us."

"But your mother—"

"She likes you, too! I think they're just asking how long you're staying out of curiosity. To make sure you'll stay with us a long time."

Giotto frowned. That could not be true when they had been asking every night at dinner for the past week. Even breakfast had started to become uncomfortably silent, with Ujizane no longer greeting them with an impatient bark. Giotto never thought he would miss that.

They strolled wordlessly through the town, steering away from the docks. Fuku looked disheartened by their conversation. Giotto felt guilty. He had given her the wrong impression, maybe several wrong impressions. Maybe he should just tell her what he and G and Knuckle had discussed. There really was little reason to keep it a secret, and she and Ugetsu _could_ help them establish themselves in Nagasaki. Besides, this would cheer her up, and that alone would be worth it.

Before he could begin giving her the news, his eyes caught the sight of a large man hovering over a small merchant stand stacked with the sweet rice cakes Ugetsu often treated them to. His face was contorted in an awful sneer as he held one of the rice cakes in his hands. The merchant trembled and sputtered apologies, but the man did not leave. A small crowd of whispering men and women circled around them, and others slowed their pace to glance at the scene from the corners of their eyes.

"Giotto-dono?" asked Fuku as Giotto gravitated with the crowd.

"You really expected me to pay for this, did you? Lousy peasant," said the man. Giotto noticed then that the man carried a sword around his hip: a samurai, he realized. Ugetsu often mentioned them whenever he talked about his brother.

"I am sorry. Please forgive me," said the merchant, all but dropping to his knees.

"Giotto-dono, let's go. It's impolite to stare," Fuku pleaded.

Giotto ignored her and pushed his way through the crowd. Samurai or not, stealing was wrong, and bullying others was something he could not forgive, either.

The samurai grabbed the hilt of his sword.

"I think I ought to teach you some manners first," he snarled as he unsheathed it and swung forward.

The crowd gasped. In that moment Giotto darted in front of the merchant with his cloak, thankful that it had been cold enough to wear it and hoping that it was just as effective against a blade as it was against bullets. When steel met cloth and Giotto felt only a dull thud, he realized that his arm was still attached. True to G's theories about Lord Piero's cloak, the attack had been nullified.

He enjoyed the victory for only a moment. The samurai pulled back and Giotto dropped his arm, glaring at the man and snapping, "I think the one who needs to learn manners is you."

The samurai pursed his lips. "Little nanban, this does not concern you. Keep your nose out of the business of my people."

"I will not," said Giotto. "Not when you're picking on someone weaker than you when you were the one who wasn't going to pay him."

"You speak pretty good Japanese for a nanban," said the samurai as he drew his sword back. "That means you know better. So I should probably teach you a lesson too!"

G appeared at Giotto's side then, gun drawn and pointed at the samurai.

"I would think twice about doing that, you cowardly son of a whore." He spat the last part in Italian, Ugetsu never having taught words like that in Japanese.

The samurai paused mid-stride, and then he snorted. "Two little nanban! I had no idea we were being taken over by these barbaric monsters. Do you realize who you two are threatening?"

"I don't care," G snarled. "You have a problem with him, you have a problem with me. Drop. Your. Sword."

The samurai stared at G, seeming as though he considered his threats to be legitimate. To Giotto's surprise and relief, he sheathed his sword, but the moment was short-lived. The samurai laughed, and he raised his hand in the air and called out for the city guards. Half a dozen of them appeared at the samurai's side in an instant.

With a smirk, the samurai said, "Arrest these boys. They have threatened one of the samurai unprovoked and deserve no less than the highest penalty."

* * *

G did not go down without a fight. To his credit, he decided that shooting the approaching guards would not help their situation, but he ignored Giotto's insistence that they run away in favor of dumping out his normal bullets for the special ones. He did not get the opportunity to fire his gun before the guards were on him. G kicked and punched and Giotto struggled to get free from their grasp.

Knuckle even showed up in time to plead the boys' case ("They're _children_ ," he had insisted repeatedly), but all of it was futile. Giotto and G soon found themselves in a dark prison cell with no other companions but rats and old bones and rusty bars.

Neither Giotto nor G spoke to one another. G strained his ears to listen for any clues as to their fates in between scouting the perimeter of the cell for a way to escape. Giotto sat in the far corner of the cell, where the rats seemed to be the least interested in, most likely for the lack of bones littering the area. He hugged his knees to his chest, struggling to find the words to say to G not only to thank him for helping but to apologize for getting him involved and arrested.

G kicked one of the cell bars, flakes of brown rust shedding to the floor.

"Damn it," he grumbled. "I really hope that the God idiot saw the bullets and picked them up. We might need them when we get out of here."

"You mean you don't have them?" Giotto did not mean to sound so disheartened.

"I think I dropped them when they grabbed me. Even if I did have them, it wouldn't do us a lot of good. They took my gun, remember?"

Giotto remembered. The guards stripped the boys of all their belongings save for their clothes, which meant that not only did they have G's weapon but Giotto's cloak and ring. In fact, the samurai had insisted that the guards confiscate Giotto's cloak.

"G, I… I'm really sorry," he said. It was now or never. "It's my fault you're in here and—"

"It's my own damn fault I'm in here," said G. "I made the choice to step in, and I don't regret it. That asshole was ready to slice your head off and I didn't have my Family's bullets loaded at the time. It was the only thing I could do, and if I could do it all over again, I would have. I wouldn't even need a moment to think about it."

Giotto felt a grin spread across his face as G turned back to inspecting the bars.

"Thank you, G," he said.

"Prison is better than dead. At least we have a chance to get out of here." G sighed. "But I don't think we can stay in Nagasaki anymore. I'm not sure if we'd be able to stay in Japan any longer. We're running out of places in the world to hide."

Giotto did not respond. G was right; it was too dangerous to stay. They stood out too much. If they broke out of prison, everyone would know exactly who to look for and they would be much too easy to find. Even if they ventured north, the guards could track them down much easier than the Medici had been able to. And they could not even say goodbye to Knuckle or Ugetsu or Fuku: to see them again would get them into trouble.

"Two years," he murmured. "We traveled two years to get all the way out here. And now we have to leave."

G did not look away from the bars. "I'm sorry, Giotto."

Giotto shook his head. "No. Grandpa told me that this was the land of beginnings. And it is. I don't know what this is the beginning of, but it's the beginning of something, right? And maybe we can return to Italy. Maybe the Medici forgot about us by now, and if they didn't—"

"The mafia don't forget so easily. If we go back, they'll kill us."

Giotto grinned. "Or try to. G, we're not who we used to be. And if we can get your Family's bullets back—and the cloak and ring—before we leave, maybe we can actually do something about the Medici and all the rest of the mafia. Don't you think?"

"It won't be that easy."

"Well, if we can get out of here and get the cloak and ring back from under the guard's noses, and get back the bullets, too, I think we'll be able to do anything. Especially if we have each other."

Then Giotto stopped and thought about what he was saying. What _was_ he saying?

"But, at the very least, let's just do that much. We don't have to worry about the Medici now, or ever, if you don't want to. It's just… I think we can go back to Italy, and they won't bother us. And if they do…"

"We'll tell them we're Vongola, not Guinizelli," said G, turning to Giotto with a smile. "And then we'll make sure they won't hurt anybody else ever again. You have some crazy ideas, Giotto. I think I like them."

"Then let's go."

Giotto picked himself from the ground and started mimicking G's inspection of the perimeter of the cell. He skimmed the walls and the bars of the jail cell, not really knowing what to look for. G felt around the floor, and when Giotto asked what he was looking for G told him that though the bars were rusted, there was no way they could force their way out.

"I'm looking for a needle or something, see if I can't pick our way out. At least they're using European locks. I'm familiar with those."

Giotto nodded and followed suit. After a few minutes of touching the cold floor and holding back a yelp whenever his fingers brushed something warm and furry, G said, "Are you sure you're willing to leave everyone behind? Knuckle, Ugetsu, Fuku…?"

"I don't want to," said Giotto. "But we have to."

G pursed his lips but silently continued his search. Giotto knew that he did not want to leave them behind either, but they had no place with them anymore. It would be cruel to ask them to go with them back to Italy. Still, they would miss them: Knuckle's loud and enthusiastic sermons and Ugetsu's music and laughter and Fuku's endlessly shy kindness.

"What are you two doing?"

Giotto gasped and quickly spun to see Knuckle standing on the other side of the bars, an eyebrow raised and a small sack in his arms.

"Knuckle!" he said as G exclaimed, "What the hell are you doing here?"

Knuckle waved a hand.

"You two got yourself into an extreme mess," he said. "Gospodin Fernão came by to try to release you, but the guards would have none of it. You do realize that a samurai has an extreme position of power in this country, right?"

"That didn't give him the right—"

"It did, Giotto. We may not agree with it, but it did give him the right to do whatever he wanted. According to Ugetsu, what he was doing was not honorable even for a samurai but some of them are drunk with power. The one you two threatened was one of those types. And he wants the two of you dead in some sort of elaborate execution. Gospodin Fernão and Ugetsu both refused to go into the details."

"Well, they won't get the chance to kill us," said G, crossing his arms. "We're getting the hell out of here. If you know what's good for you, you'd leave so you can feign innocence. By the way, do you have those bullets?"

Knuckle held up a small sack.

"I even got back your ring and cloak, Giotto. I told them that they were family heirlooms that I had entrusted to you. And as for leaving so I can pretend like I didn't know you two were planning on escaping, G, I think you extremely misunderstand my purpose for this visit."

He pulled a small pin from his pocket. "I told the guards that it is our custom for a priest to absolve the sins of the condemned before death. But I know a thing or two about lock-picking, to the extreme."

Giotto's jaw dropped, and G said not ungratefully, "Lying is a sin, you God damned idiot priest."

"God forgives all sins if they are properly repented," said Knuckle as he worked the lock. "And more importantly, I could never face Him at the gates of Heaven if I let you two die in the morning."

With a click, the lock fell to the floor and Knuckle pushed the door open. "We have to hurry. There's no telling when they'll be by to tell me my time is up."

Giotto and G hurried out of the prison cell, taking from Knuckle their respective belongings. As Giotto wrapped himself in the cloak, he heard the clang of metal and the howls of men falling to the ground from the other side of the wall that separated the prison from the rest of the building. Knuckle positioned himself in front of the boys with his fists to his face, trembling from the inevitability of having to break his vow yet again.

"Don't worry about it, Father," G muttered as he loaded his gun with a black-colored bullet. "You won't have to sin more than you already have."

Before Knuckle could respond, the door slid open, revealing a black-clad man with two swords in each hand, each a different length. Black cloth covered his entire face save for his awfully familiar eyes. He stared at the three for a long moment, murmuring something under his breath.

A noise behind the man caught his attention. He spun to greet the new threat by taking a low fighting stance. After a tense moment, he waved at the three of them to come to him, but none of them budged.

"Is this our executioner here early?" asked G.

Knuckle shook his head. "I don't think so. He's not acting like I think an executioner would."

The black-clad man waved at them again, and Giotto knew him to be an ally.

"We should follow him," he said. "I think he's helping us escape."

G sighed but did not protest. "Fine, but if he winds up killing us, we're going to have a nice, long talk in Hell about being entirely too trusting of strangers."

They followed closely behind the man as they ducked behind walls, darting through open hallways that were lined with unconscious guards. Whenever a group of guards came into their path, the black-clad man wasted no time in drawing his swords. Before Giotto could blink all of them had fallen to the ground in a large heap. The black-clad man pushed past them, only glancing back to make sure Giotto, G, and Knuckle were still behind him.

Finally, they left the final walls of the building, quietly slinking through the trees and bushes to the gates. There they stopped, the black-clad man peering back onto the grounds to make sure they were not being followed.

As Giotto struggled to catch his breath, the man pulled off his mask. A beaming Ugetsu stood before them, and Giotto felt as though he would never be able to breathe right again.

* * *

Ugetsu led them through the back alleys toward the docks, telling them what they already knew.

"You can't stay here," he said in a strangely mournful voice. "They'll find you if you stay on the island, or even if you tried to head up to Kyoto. Going on the ship is your only chance. I think they leave sometime tomorrow morning. I have some extra money I can give you for anything you might need for the trip."

They reached the harbor, hiding up against the wall of a Portuguese-owned smithy. A large Portuguese trade ship loomed ahead of them with only a large crowd of people bustling in their way. Easier said than done, Giotto realized, but a bigger question nagged at him.

"Ugetsu, where did you learn how to fight like that?" he asked. "Fuku told me that most nobles anymore have to learn sword-fighting, but that was always more Ujizane's concern, not yours, and that you cared more for music than swordsmanship."

Ugetsu grinned, but something in his smile was strained. "Fuku-chan is right. Men have to know how to fight. Ani-ue tells me every day that our position as nobility is threatened with the rise of the samurai and that we have to be as much a part of them as we can so we don't lost our power. I train with Ani-ue some mornings. I don't like it, but it's something I have to do. I really do prefer music to it."

His face fell. "It's something that even Ani-ue agrees I'm better suited for. But that doesn't matter now. Friendship always comes first, right?"

He tried to smile again, but this time even G and Knuckle noticed that something was off.

"Are you okay, Ugetsu?" asked Knuckle.

G said softly, immediately after the priest, "What happened? What did you do?"

"It's fine. It doesn't matter," said Ugetsu. "They were going to have you killed tomorrow, and I couldn't stand by and do nothing. You understand, don't you? Come, let's find a way to get you onto the ship."

Giotto frowned. He understood the feeling of not doing anything when others were in danger, and especially his friends, but something about the boy's demeanor was unsettling.

"Ugetsu—" he began, but he was cut off by a small voice from behind them.

"Ugetsu-ani-ue, there you are," said Fuku, crouching next to her brother. "I've been looking all over for you."

She looked at Giotto, and then G, and then Knuckle, and her face became distressed. "So it's true. You helped them escape."

"What do you mean, 'so it's true?'" asked G. "We didn't bust out too long ago. Does everyone already know?"

Fuku shook her head. "No, not everyone. Not yet, anyway. But Ujizane-ani-ue went to the prison and once he found out what had happened, he said that it was you, Ugetsu-ani-ue. That you probably had some swords somewhere in the house that he didn't know about, because all of his were still there and that you had disappeared, and you were the only who could do such a thing."

Giotto could not read Ugetsu's face.

"I see," he said. He sighed and glanced at the mask he had worn in the prison. "I'd wanted to protect you, and Ani-ue, and Mother."

"Ugetsu-ani-ue… Ujizane-ani-ue, he… he's disowned you." Fuku dropped her head and covered her face with her hands. "He said that you have dishonored our family and have no place among us anymore. If you go back home, they'll have you…" She trailed off into her sobs.

A stunned silence fell over everybody. Giotto watched Ugetsu carefully, seeing his face transform from horror to distressed acceptance.

"I… see," he said slowly. "It's probably better this way anyway."

"Like hell it is!" G snapped, so loud that even Knuckle jumped. "That son of a bitch, why am I not surprised that he would pull shit like this?"

"G!" cried Giotto, begging for his best friend to quiet down.

"This is _not_ what family is about!"

Ugetsu said, "Yes, it is, G-dono. They probably would have figured out it was me eventually. Ani-ue is only making sure that Fuku-chan and Mother is safe. They would punish all of us for what I have done. This way, I am the only one who suffers."

"It's… it's _not fair_ ," G insisted. Giotto recognized the look in his eyes: it was the same look he had back in Racale when Giotto threw the apple core at the back of the Medici man's head, and the same look he had in the Guinizelli mansion when he shot the man strangling Giotto during the massacre of his Family. "For our sake, you… it's _not fair_."

Ugetsu gently laughed, in spite of the situation. "Life is rarely fair, G-dono. But I'd do it again, because I meant it. Friendship is more important than anything."

Fuku launched herself into her brother's arms, sobbing into his shoulder.

"I love you, Ani-ue. I love you and thank you so much," she said over and over again. Ugetsu gently embraced her, and Giotto realized what Ugetsu's fate would be. For helping two prisoners condemned to death escape, he was now facing execution himself.

Giotto could not allow that.

"Ugetsu, come with us," he said. "Please. I can't let you… I can't let you die after everything you've done for us."

Brother and sister stared at Giotto as they processed what he said. Oh, Giotto hoped that his Japanese made sense despite how upset he was.

"Giotto-dono, I—" Ugetsu closed his eyes. "It doesn't matter where I go."

"Ugetsu, we're going to Italy," said G softly. "We're going to Italy and I remember you saying how much you want to see it. Here's your chance. And more importantly, Giotto's right. After everything you've done, this is the least we can do to repay you. Please."

"G-dono…" Ugetsu murmured. He glanced at Fuku, who nodded with a small smile, and then Knuckle. He sighed, but the familiar bright smile soon covered his face again. "Alright. I'll go with you."

There was still something off about his smile, but Giotto knew they had many months of travel ahead to figure it out. At least this way, Asari Ugetsu would not die for their sake, and they would not have to say goodbye to him anytime soon.


	8. Interlude 1: When in Rome

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **There will be an attempted suicide in this chapter.** I know it's a touchy subject, so please, use your discretion. If you wish to skip this chapter for any reason, feel free. This is as dark as the fic will go; things will considerably brighten up next chapter.

G handed the merchant the old coins Ugetsu had pushed into his hands before he snuck out of the cargo bay of the Portuguese ship. He grabbed the packages of provisions and thanked the merchant in excruciatingly slow Japanese with as much of a Portuguese accent as he could muster. As he walked away, he pulled the hood over his red hair as he passed one of the city guards patrolling the streets undoubtedly for their little band of felons. G heard them halt in their steps and he could feel their narrowed eyes following his back, but he did not peer over his shoulder until he turned a street corner. They continued on their way, seemingly deciding that he was not the boy they were looking for.

 _Idiots_ , G thought as he reached into his pockets for a match and a cigarette. The Portuguese had an extra crate of them in the cargo bay, apparently for their own personal use and not for trade.

Knuckle and Giotto had not approved of his rummaging through the crates; Giotto worried that the sailors would notice before the ship took sail at noon and that they would find them and turn them in. Knuckle simply reminded G that tobacco was "extremely addictive" and could not be healthy. G snapped at Knuckle to mind his own business and assured Giotto that the sailors never kept good track of their own stocks of anything. If they noticed, they probably would blame each other before trying to find a stowaway thief.

Giotto had not looked convinced but he did not press the matter further.

"Just take one," he had said with a sigh. G grinned and did exactly that.

But all of them were in agreement: they had to leave the stores of food untouched. They could only nibble on so much before anybody realized that it was not rats sneaking away crumbs. While this would likely not happen before it was too late to turn around and take them right back to Japan, they had little interest in trying to escape the law twice.

And so, they sent G out in a makeshift disguise to buy all that they would need for the few days it took to get to China. He was the one who could run the errand and return in the least amount of time and by drawing the least amount of attention. "Be careful," Giotto had bid him, and G promised to be back within half an hour.

It was getting close to that time. G turned into an empty alleyway and saw the Portuguese ship looming nearby in the harbor. He stopped against the wall to take a quick drag before realizing that this was the exact alleyway they had stopped in last night, when Ugetsu's sister came to tell them the terrible news.

G scowled. That son of a whore of a brother. Last night, after parting ways with Fuku and just before they made the mad dash to the ship, G had said, without thinking, "Why don't you go kill that backstabbing asshole?"

Everyone had given him appalled looks.

"G!" Giotto had hissed with the tiniest hint of fury. Knuckle had launched into a sermon about turning the other cheek, about how exacting revenge would solve nothing, and about how killing was a sin, all of which G had done his best to ignore.

But nothing made G want to take back his words more than the look of despair on Ugetsu's face, of conflict, of heartbreak.

"He is my brother, G-dono," Ugetsu had said quietly. "It would be dishonorable, and I have disgraced my family and myself enough."

Then he cast his gaze to the dark water lapping against the port and made a face that G hoped to never see again.

G threw his cigarette to the cobbled ground and stomped his foot on it. He leaned back against the wall and stared at the ship again, reflecting on how Ugetsu had yet to smile like he used to and laugh like he used to. It had only been a few hours, and G knew he had little reason to have his smiles reach his eyes and have his bell-like laughs sound less forced, but something about his quiet melancholy disturbed him. It was as though he had not let go of the fact that he was to be executed, that he could not escape his fate no matter where he ran to, and that he did not actually want to go with them to Italy, that he only agreed to it to appease his sister.

Even Giotto, being as eerily perceptive as he was, picked up on it, asking Ugetsu about it as soon as they found a quiet, dark corner in the cargo bay where the sailors would be less likely to spot them.

"Ugetsu, is there something more going on than you're telling us?"

After a moment's hesitation, Ugetsu had promised them that he was fine. It wasn't until G asked him about the coins Ugetsu had that he finally gave in.

"My instruments are worth a lot of money," he had said. "That's how I was able to buy these swords and still have some left over for you. I'd hoped to eventually convince Ani-ue to get me another one, perhaps for the New Year, but…" Then he smiled. "It doesn't matter. You are more important to me."

G remembered how he spent his afternoons listening to Ugetsu perform his music, enthralled by the raw emotion and power and passion in each note that floated out of the flute. G noticed that his eyes shone the brightest whenever he touched the instrument, and that every time he set it down to focus on his other studies his eyes betrayed his longing to play it again.

This wasn't fair. G and Giotto had put themselves into their own mess and had been quite ready to get themselves out of it. He had not expected the priest to bust them out of the jail cell—not that they needed his help; G could have figured a way out before dawn, certainly—and then Ugetsu gave up everything to save them. Now Ugetsu was the one suffering for their indiscretions.

G pulled out the remaining coins from his pockets and counted how much he had left. He did not have much time, but there was one last thing he had to try to do before they left Japan for good.

* * *

To Giotto's surprise, they had managed to land in China undetected by the Portuguese sailors. After sneaking in between crates being moved from ship to harbor they quickly assimilated themselves among the crowd of Liampó, trying to locate a European-friendly inn to stay for the night while they decided on their next move.

As soon as they found an inn with plentiful Portuguese on the outskirts of the city, Knuckle handed the few coins he had left from their last trip into Liampó that he had forgotten to exchange with Fernão those months ago. He only had enough for one room with one bed that was big enough for one of them, and they launched into a heated discussion over who would _not_ take it.

"I can't take the bed in good conscience, to the extreme," said Knuckle.

Ugetsu forced a laugh. "I'm not used to a bed like that. I don't think I'd be comfortable."

"Giotto, I think that means it's yours," said G with a shrug.

"No, that's fine, one of you can take it. I mean, I don't think I can deny a priest a bed and Ugetsu, well…"

This continued for another fifteen minutes before Knuckle and Ugetsu finally sided with G on the issue. Giotto took the two pillows and blanket from the bed and handed them to his friends, telling them that they should at least have that, which they all accepted with little argument. The three claimed their spots on the floor, with Ugetsu closest to the door and G closest to Giotto. After a brief discussion about trying to find another caravan to travel back to Europe with first thing in the morning and sorting out what they had on them to sell for bargaining chips, they laid down for another uncomfortable night of rest.

To be fair, Giotto finally had a comfortable place to sleep even without pillows or a blanket, but long after Knuckle said a prayer in Russian and blew out the candle, Giotto found himself still staring at the ceiling. Every so often he would close his eyes and try to fall asleep, but after rolling first to his left side and then to his right he was right back on his back, sighing at the darkened wooden ceiling.

It was not as though he had been able to sleep well on the boat. The heavy footsteps of the sailors above their heads had kept him up worrying, and if not that, then the soft swaying of the boat kept him too queasy to try to sleep. He should be plenty tired now, just like G who crashed as soon as his head hit pillow and Knuckle who snored gently into the blanket he had bundled up under his head.

Nagasaki's guards would not think to look for them out here if they had not bothered searching the boat before it left the harbor. They had escaped the notice of the sailors soundly. They were safe now.

But something was _wrong_.

Giotto glanced over at the door where Ugetsu took his rest, his back to the others. Ever since leaving Nagasaki, he had become silent, only speaking whenever one of them directly addressed him. His eyes were almost always downcast as he knelt with his hands planted firmly on his knees and his brows furrowed in a manner unbecoming for a boy who never seemed to stop smiling. Often, the shortest of his blades sat in front of him, and Giotto realized that it was about the same length of the same flute he had sold to save them.

He meant to thank and apologize to Ugetsu so many times, but every time his voice caught in his throat and he could not bring himself to say anything. Every word that crossed his mind sounded inane compared to everything Ugetsu lost, and Giotto felt as though nothing he said would help Ugetsu smile again. The sooner they reached Italy, the better. If they even made it that far.

Giotto frowned at that thought. _If_? But then Ugetsu stirred and his hand reached for one of the four swords resting against the wall. The shortest one, Giotto saw, and Ugetsu stared at it for a few seconds before sitting up.

He immediately took notice of Giotto, and he forced a smile.

"Giotto-dono," he said with false cheer. "You can't sleep?"

Giotto shook his head slowly. He opened his mouth once then shut it, biting his lip. He had to ask it, even if he knew what Ugetsu would say since they had this conversation so many times before.

"Ugetsu, are you alright?"

"Of course, Giotto-dono. I was just thinking. You don't have to worry about me."

"I'm your friend, Ugetsu. Of course I'm going to worry about you. You're not acting like yourself."

"I'll be fine, Giotto-dono. Really." And then, quietly, Ugetsu said something he had not said before, his eyes glued to the small sword. "You won't have to worry about me anymore."

Giotto snapped up as Ugetsu climbed to his feet, grabbing his swords and heading out the door.

"Ugetsu, what—"

"I'm going for a walk," he said. He paused for a brief moment just outside of the room, and a distant smile crossed his face. "Goodbye, Giotto-dono."

And then he was gone.

Giotto gaped at where Ugetsu once stood, trying to process his words. Something was _wrong_. Something was dreadfully wrong and Giotto for the life of him could not figure out what, but he knew he could not let Ugetsu walk away like that. Not right now. Not by himself.

He fell to the floor and nudged G awake. "G. _G_. Wake up!"

G groaned and rubbed his eyes. "Wha…? Giotto, it's still dark," he mumbled, rolling back over to bury his head into the pillow. Beside him, Knuckle stirred.

"G, it's Ugetsu," said Giotto. "I think… he's gone. He just left, and I don't think he's planning on coming back."

One eye flew open. "What are you talking about, Giotto? What do you mean, he's not coming back?"

"He _just left_ , G! He just left with his swords and he said some things including goodbye and _I don't think he's going to come back._ " Giotto realized his voice was rising, shaking.

G sat up and stared at the open door, his face wrought with fear and panic.

"When did he leave? Just now?" Giotto nodded. "Are you… are you sure? Maybe he just went for a walk, and his Italian still isn't good so maybe you misunderstood him—"

"I don't think Giotto misunderstood him," said Knuckle, standing. "You noticed it too, haven't you, G? Ugetsu has extremely not been himself lately. He has all the reason in the world to be the way he has been, but I trust Giotto's intuition, to the extreme. We need to follow him. All of us, together."

Giotto pulled at G's arm, giving Knuckle a small, appreciative grin and seeing all of his worries in the priest's eyes.

"We can't let him leave us. Not after everything he's done for us."

For a moment, G looked completely dumbstruck, slowly letting everything sink in. Then he hopped up and stuffed his feet clumsily into his shoes, running out the door without waiting for either Giotto or Knuckle. They wasted no time in following him, Giotto forgetting to grab the cloak until they were well out of the inn and down the street, and he wondered if maybe, just maybe, they had not eluded the Nagasaki city guards or the Portuguese sailors as well as they hoped. And maybe, just maybe, Ugetsu's departure had something to do with them. With a single glance at G and Knuckle, Giotto knew that they would be helpless if Ugetsu was in any danger.

But before any of that, they had to reach Ugetsu first.

G stopped at the end of the street, looking down first the right road and then the left, both empty save for one or two wandering drunks.

"Damn it… _damn it_."

He spun back around, and Giotto noticed his horror-stricken eyes.

" _Damn it!_ Maybe he went down the other way. Why did I go this way? We should split up. I'll go back down the other way, and you two—"

For the rest of his life, Giotto could not comprehend why he gazed at the trees beyond the road, on the other side of the trickling creek, or why, without a word to G or Knuckle, he ran straight into the woods. G and Knuckle followed closely behind with G questioning Giotto's move and that they should go back, because it was impossible that Ugetsu would have left the city this way.

Then they came to a small clearing where Ugetsu sat, but Giotto could not breathe a sigh of relief, not with the sight that greeted him. Ugetsu knelt the same way he had in the cargo hold of the Portuguese ship, his hands placed dutifully on his knees and his eyes wistfully closed. Three of his swords laid next to him, the fourth and the shortest in front of him. As he opened his eyes, he reached for the fourth sword, took a short bow, and unsheathed it. Finally, to Giotto's horror, he held the hilt with both hands and aimed the blade at his bare torso.

"Ugetsu!" he called out. He did not take a single step towards his friend before a flash of red hair pushed past him and landed a solid blow to Ugetsu's face with a clenched fist. "G!"

Giotto and Knuckle rushed to the pair, trying to pull G off of Ugetsu but G refused to let go of the seams of Ugetsu's loose white robe.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" G bellowed, his voice raw, giving Ugetsu a small but forceful shake.

"G, stop it, this is not helping," said Knuckle.

G ignored him, repeating himself over and over again his voice breaking more each time before declining to silence. The shock on Ugetsu's face faded into something Giotto could not quite place his finger on. Guilt, regret, pain, hopelessness?

Ugetsu turned his face away from them and remained silent.

"Ugetsu," Giotto managed, his heartbeat still thundering in his ears. "Why? Why are you doing this? I don't understand… why would you do something like this?"

Ugetsu responded softly, "I am dishonored, disgraced. This is all that's left for me to do. This is the only path left for me."

His words swam circles in Giotto's head. "What do you mean? I don't understand."

"I extremely thought that you left Japan so that you wouldn't die," said Knuckle. "Why would you throw away your chance like this?"

"It doesn't matter where I go. This will be my fate no matter how far away from home I get. And I left Nagasaki so that I could end this on my own terms instead of waiting around to see if I was to be executed as a noble or as a commoner. At least this way, even though I ran, I can die more honorably than if I stayed."

Knuckle's face twisted in disgust, an expression Giotto had never seen on the priest. "This is honorable?"

Ugetsu gave Knuckle a quizzical look. "Yes. You… don't think so?" He turned to Giotto.

"I…" Giotto started. "I don't know. I just… wouldn't it be better to live?"

"In shame?"

"What do you mean, 'in shame'?" snapped G, giving Ugetsu another jerk. "What are you trying to say, that you wish you never helped us escape? Because if that's the case, then you shouldn't have. You didn't have to. We were already halfway out by the time you showed up anyway!"

" _G_ ," Giotto hissed, once again trying to take him off of Ugetsu. He still did not budge. "G, don't be so ungrateful."

Glancing at Ugetsu, he continued, "We… we really do appreciate you coming in to save us. I don't think we could have done so well against the guards by ourselves, and you were incredible with the sword—"

"I'm _not_ being ungrateful," said G, turning his tear-soaked face to Giotto. Giotto's breath caught in his throat. " _He's_ the one who… he's the one who's saying that he's ashamed for having ever helped us."

"That's not what I'm saying, G-dono," said Ugetsu, alarmed. He placed his hands over G's and gently removed them from his robe. "Meeting you, and Giotto-dono and Knuckle-dono, being your friend… I don't regret it. Not for a second.

"The shame isn't that I helped you. I have been dishonored, disgraced, disowned. And this—" He looked at the small sword that had flown out of his hands when G hit him, now laying out of arm's reach on the cold dirt. "—this is the only thing left to do when that happens. It has nothing to do with you. This is simply my fate. And I would take nothing back. I am very happy to have known all of you, to have helped all of you."

"Quit talking like that," said G. "We're not going to let you do this."

Ugetsu only smiled. Giotto had the sinking feeling that they could not convince him out of this, and he did not know where to even begin to try. Ugetsu was talking like Grandmama and Grandpa did the hours before their deaths. His eyes burned with tears, and he shook his head.

"Ugetsu, you can't," said Giotto quietly, knowing how helpless and awful his words were. "You can't do this. This isn't fair."

Finally, Knuckle spoke, his voice less hostile than before. "This isn't a case of what's fair and what isn't, Giotto. This is just part of the culture he grew up in. But Ugetsu, we're not in Japan anymore. I don't know about here in China, but where we're going, what you're planning to do is a sin against God, and it is extremely frowned down upon."

Ugetsu stared at Knuckle, his face unreadable. The priest continued.

"There is a saying your people and ours share. 'When in the village, obey the village,'" he recited in Japanese, and then in Italian, he said, "Ours is, 'When in Rome, do as the Romans do.' Ugetsu, we would have still tried to stop you if you tried to do this in Japan because of our culture, but I know we would have had to eventually accept it. It is the way of your people, whether or not we agree with it.

"But we're not there anymore, and we will not accept it. _I_ cannot accept it, because every life is precious and a gift. And yours especially so. But more importantly, we cannot accept it because you are our friend, and we cannot bear to lose you."

"But what do you do when you have been dishonored?" asked Ugetsu, shifting his eyes back to the small sword. "How can you live with yourselves?"

"We move on, and we work extremely hard to get that honor back. We don't give up."

Ugetsu first looked at Knuckle, then at Giotto, and then at G, his brows furrowed in thought. Then he said in Japanese, slowly, "'When in the village, obey the village.'"

He smiled, and his next Italian words delighted Giotto that Knuckle's words had gotten through to him. "You're right, Knuckle-dono. I am not home anymore. If this is a sin for you, then it is also a sin for me, right? I'm sorry to have worried you all."

* * *

The next morning, a handful of Portuguese traders saw Knuckle's cassock and collar and decided to dine with the priest for breakfast, yearning for the company of a man of God. After enduring complaints from the traders over the heathens of the east for the better part of the morning, Knuckle found out that they were leaving for Portugal at the end of the week. He did not even have to ask if he could accompany them; they extended an invitation and were more than happy to accommodate his three companions, free of charge.

He returned to the room he shared with the three boys, keeping a tight grip on the small dagger Ugetsu had tried to take his own life with the night before. Though Ugetsu promised he would not try again, Knuckle had dealt with enough desperate victims of the mafia in Solntse to know better. It was unbecoming for a priest to carry around a weapon, let alone four, so he had Giotto keep Ugetsu's other three blades in his possession.

"But he said he wouldn't," Giotto had protested after G and Ugetsu retired to the room. Fear trembled in his eyes: he did not want to believe anything that had just happened.

"Given the chance, Giotto, he will, to the extreme. This goes beyond dishonor. If he falls back into his desperation, he will try again, and next time we might not be able to stop him."

Knuckle slowly opened the door where only a pile of pillows and a blanket on top of the bed greeted him. The boys had gone into town to see what they could do about exchanging what little foreign coin they had left to buy food and other supplies. Knuckle noticed a glint of metal underneath the bed. Peering underneath, he saw that Giotto had wrapped the swords in his cloak before they left to keep them as far away from Ugetsu as possible.

Knuckle put on a grim smile and sat on the edge of the bed, taking the small sword out of his pocket. He pulled the blade from the bamboo scabbard and examined the dangerous simplicity of the weapon. Ugetsu had traded in something so perfect and beautiful as his instrument, his path to the purity and joy of music, for something so sharp and deadly. Knuckle could not deny that Ugetsu's sword fighting was nearly as graceful as his music, but he also could not ignore the fact that without his music, Ugetsu seemed lost. Dead, even. And Knuckle wanted the Ugetsu they met in Nagasaki back as much as Giotto and G did.

He cringed as he remembered the ruckus from the night before. He had not meant to preach to Ugetsu the way he did, but he had been so scared, so desperate. While he could tell the people of Solntse to put their faith in God and that their life is a gift from Him, and while he could quote Bible verses at them to encourage them to push through the hard times, he knew that those words would have meant nothing to Ugetsu. It would not have worked.

He reached into his pocket and pulled out the yellow stone ring he had found in the church gardens in Solntse. If Ugetsu had succeeded last night, would this ring have been enough to save him? Would God have been kind enough to keep Knuckle from seeing another one of his friends die? He slipped the ring on and clenched his fist, wondering if God had forsaken him when he used these same hands to fight last winter.

Still nothing. Maybe Giotto was right, that he had to have the resolve to heal someone before anything could come from it. Or maybe God really had decided that Knuckle was beyond redemption but that Ugetsu was not, and that was why He had let them find Ugetsu just before he had taken the plunge rather than after.

Knuckle buried his head into his palms. Trying to stop men and women from taking their own lives in Solntse was one thing: he had cared for them as a Father should, but he barely remembered their names. He considered Ugetsu a real and true friend, and he knew that Giotto and G cared for and loved him, too.

Why wasn't it enough?

The door swung open. Knuckle lifted his head to see G standing there, an annoyed look on his red-splotched face. Knuckle frowned. What happened? The red curves were too perfect, too pointed, too deliberate to be blood.

Before he could ask, G demanded, "What the hell are you doing here, you lazy merda of a priest? You're supposed to be finding us a caravan to go back to Italy with."

Knuckle resisted the urge to make a jab at the boy's new face design. "I did. They leave in a couple of days, and they're patrons at this inn. They're allowing us to travel with them for free. How are you three doing?"

He noticed that neither Giotto nor Ugetsu were behind G.

G kicked at the floorboards. "Fine, I guess. This language is damn near impossible, you know that? At least something good came out of our latest flub."

Then he smirked and pointed at his face. "Pretty awesome, don't you think?"

"Is it permanent?"

His grin grew wider. "Of course it is."

Knuckle sighed and shook his head. This was something else that God did not approve of, but he was not going to say anything this time, for now. However, his silence was enough to make G strut over to him with a sense of pride before his grin weakened.

"At the very least, you should be happy that that whole fiasco made Ugetsu laugh, finally," said G quietly. "Something's still off, but at least it was genuine."

"Where is he? Is Giotto with him?"

G nodded. "They're downstairs eating. I told them I was going to come up here to find something to sell so we can pay the innkeeper back for the food. Sounds like we'll need more money for the extra nights we're staying."

Knuckle waved his hand. "Do not worry about it. The traders told me they'll foot our bill, to the extreme."

G stared at Knuckle, astonished. "Well… good." A beat. "You look awful, priest. Maybe that's why. They're just taking pity on you."

"That may be, but I know better than to question an extreme blessing like this," said Knuckle, fully aware that G referred to the bags under his eyes. He had the same under his own. Knuckle had remained awake throughout the night, making sure Ugetsu did not try to sneak out again, and he knew that G could not fall back to sleep either. Really, none of them could, though all of them pretended to.

"We should probably still sell something, just in case," said G, staring at the dagger in Knuckle's hand. "Something that's probably worth a decent amount of money."

Knuckle gently curled his hand around the blade, minding the sharp edges. "I extremely think that would be a bad idea, G."

"Giotto said you're the one who wanted to keep those things away from him," G snarled.

"Getting rid of them isn't the answer."

G's face turned red. "You figlio di puttana, make more sense! What's the point of keeping them around when the only one who knows how to use them is the one who wants to use them on himself?"

"Like I told Giotto, this goes beyond dishonor," said Knuckle. "I think I don't need to remind you what the extreme costs of these swords were."

G fell silent, reaching his hand into his bag. He looked the same as last night when he grasped onto Ugetsu, only no tears streaking his cheeks and the whites of his eyes still white.

"Okay, you pompinara," he muttered. "You're right. I'll figure something else out."

* * *

The Portuguese traders Knuckle secured transportation with invited all of them to a rambunctious dinner complete with Chinese wine and imported whiskey and beer from Europe. The innkeeper kept the plates of food flowing out the kitchen door and the Portuguese kept pouring coin into his hands. Though Knuckle did not touch a sip of the alcohol, he was, as expected, the loudest foreigner of the bunch. G did his best to quiet him, though his efforts were in vain; Knuckle just kept getting louder and louder until finally, Giotto had to ask G to stop trying.

Ugetsu smiled at the scene, and he laughed, but he could not decide if he did those things because it was expected of him or not. Desired of him. The more he thought about it, the tenser his mouth felt and the more distant his laughter sounded. Finally, he quit trying, and he quietly slipped out the front door.

So much about Liampó reminded Ugetsu of Nagasaki but too much was too different. On this side of Liampó, the streets were quieter, the only noises being the party in the inn and mothers calling for their sons and daughters to come in for the night. Ugetsu could not speak to anybody outside of Giotto, G, and Knuckle. The smells were beyond just fish and sweets but of many different types of animals Ugetsu never knew could be cooked and eaten. The locals gave his outfit, and not the others, a second glance. He recognized many characters but none of them meant what he thought they meant, which had given them more than a few troubles already while running their errand.

He wondered about Mother, and Ujizane, and Fuku. Had Ujizane's scheme worked? Was the family safe and away from scrutiny? Or did his flight from Nagasaki ruin them? Should he have stayed to make absolute sure that they would not be punished for his impudence, no matter the cost of his own honor?

Then he remembered Fuku's desperate eyes, bidding him to leave Nagasaki, asking him to restore his honor and dignity… or was she asking him to _live_? Ugetsu was not so sure anymore.

Ugetsu arrived at the same small stream he had crossed just the night before with his swords at his side. This time, he had nothing but the robes on his back. This time, he stopped at the edge of the river. This time, he was certain Giotto, G, and Knuckle did not follow him.

Not that they would need to. He promised. He promised he would not die, at least not by his own hands. He promised he would live. He had no intentions of breaking that promise.

And yet, he wondered if the stream was any deeper downstream.

Ugetsu frowned. _Stop it._ According to Knuckle, by their standards, his honor would never be restored if he took his own life. And now, because Giotto and G and Knuckle was all he had left, that was all that mattered. He had no family, no home. No music, no passion. No honor. He only had his friends, his friends who begged him not to leave them. Even G, usually so cold, had tears streaking down his cheeks. Knuckle, usually so composed even when loud and enthusiastic, panicked. Giotto, who always wore his heart on his sleeve, desperate and terrified.

"Ugetsu," called a voice behind him, startling him out of his reverie. "What are you doing out here?"

Ugetsu turned and stifled a chuckle at the sight of G's tattoo. It was not that it looked ridiculous—Ugetsu thought the red flames fit the boy perfectly and actually looked quite good—but he wondered just how awfully they had butchered the language to go from asking for a simple currency exchange to paying for _that_.

G, however, did not look so amused. "You shouldn't be by yourself."

"I'm fine, G-dono," said Ugetsu. "I just needed to be alone for a little while." He chose not to say that he'd been alone all night anyway. He did not want G to feel badly.

Concern tinted G's red eyes. "You weren't thinking about… were you?"

"No, of course not. I do not break my promises. And besides, Giotto-dono and Knuckle-dono took my swords." He realized too late that he probably should not have said that last bit.

G narrowed his eyes. "I know you're not completely stupid, Ugetsu. I know you know there are other ways of killing yourself. And you're an awful liar."

Ugetsu turned back to the stream, remembering that the deepest part had barely reached his knees. He thought about holding himself underneath, about how far the river could have taken him before anybody found him, and about how he hoped that the people who did would not be his friends, because he knew, now, just how horribly their hearts would shatter.

"Yes, I thought about it," Ugetsu finally admitted. "But I wasn't going to do it." It was too impractical. "I couldn't break my promise to you."

"That's it? That's the only reason… Ugetsu, you cagacazzo. That's why you're still thinking about it, isn't it?" G was at his side now, his hands stuffed into his pockets and his eyes fixated on the stream. "You need more reason than just that. That pezzo di merda priest is right. This is more than just your honor. You lost… everything: family, home, honor, country, passion. I know a little bit about that."

Ugetsu stayed silent, letting G continue. "But all of those things are something you can get back. Not all at once. And it won't ever be the same, but… Giotto and I both lost our families and our homes, too. Now we have that with each other. The priest lost his honor and his passion, but he found a new… annoying… passion, and through that, he has gotten his honor back. You're not alone, Ugetsu. And so long as we're around, you're not going to be."

G smirked. "You're not getting rid of us."

Ugetsu stewed over G's words for a moment. "I can't replace my family."

"No one's asking you to. Even if—" G cut himself off, though Ugetsu knew what he was about to say. He was thankful that he did not say it because he could not hear another word against Ujizane again. "No one's asking you to. Just… there's more to family than blood. You know that, right?"

Yes, he knew that. "I don't want a new passion either, G-dono."

G fidgeted with his pockets. "Yeah, I know. And again, no one's asking you to get a new one."

He pulled out a white cloth from his pocket, wrapping messily around something cylindrical, and he handed it to Ugetsu.

"We had extra money. And, well, we've… I've never really thanked you for what you did. Or apologized. Consider this, you know, both. For me and Giotto. That stupid priest can figure it out for himself."

Ugetsu unwrapped the cloth, and he froze at sight of the bamboo flute now resting in his hands. "G-dono…"

"It's probably not as good as your old one," said G, looking away. "And it's probably not enough, but… it's something, right?"

Ugetsu smiled, warmth filling him up and tears watering his eyes. "It's more than something, G-dono. This is… Thank you. Thank you so much."

At the very least, Ugetsu knew, it was a start. G was right. He just hoped he had the strength enough for his new life, but even if he did not, he at least had his friends to help pull him through.


	9. Interlude 2: Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shimon Arc notes: The flashback in Chapter 308 where Giotto and Cozart meet takes place just prior to this interlude, and the flashback of Chapter 313 takes place sometime after the first scene. As for the ages, Giotto and G are about 13 years old, Ugetsu is about 16, Knuckle 22, Lampo 11, and Alaude 21 years old.

"Lampo, could I talk to you for a minute?"

The young lord in question had just popped a big, juicy purple grape into his mouth and was about to wave the intruder away, but he thought better of it. Giotto had saved his life once. Though Lampo barely remembered that night, before his father passed away he told and retold Lampo the story every time he demanded his shiny green ring back.

Since the funeral, Lampo had ordered the servants to search the house high and low for the ring but they had not succeeded yet. Needless to say, when Giotto had asked about it the day after he and his strange passé of companions showed up at his doorstep three months ago, Lampo had been plenty embarrassed though he refused to let the older boy know it. He hoped that he had distracted Giotto enough with the gift his father left for him in his will; Giotto never did ask about it again.

"Of course, Giotto. Anything you need."

Giotto nodded and moved to take a seat on the chair across from the soft, cushioned sofa where Lampo lounged. He wore simple clothes, Lampo noted, despite his offer of much nicer garbs to look more like he lodged with a lord and less like a peasant boy. He did not wear the gifts Lampo's father had given him save for the sky blue ring, but Lampo supposed that despite the rainclouds rolling over the estate it was much too warm and impractical to wear a cloak and gloves indoors. Besides, the maids knew better than to let the villa grow too cold.

"When G and I were in town yesterday, we heard some rumors, and we were wondering if they were true or not." Giotto paused as if to ask Lampo permission to continue. Lampo shrugged and reached for another grape. "Is it… is it true that the Trissino Family is mafia?"

Lampo dropped the grape. It hit his chin and rolled to the floor. Then he composed himself. That matter had been taken care of a long time ago. His father had seen to it; Lampo just had to keep up his family's end of the bargain.

"They're nothing to worry about."

"Mafia is always something to worry about, Lampo."

"I'm taking care of it."

"How?"

"Papa used to pay them. It's up to me to continue that. If I do, they won't bother me or the farmers or townspeople."

Giotto took this in for a moment. "It's just like G and Cozart said, then. Lampo, they're not just taking your money but the money of all the farmers and the townspeople who are struggling just to eat. G and… a friend of ours told me of some of the other things they're having the poorer people do. They're not leaving your people alone."

Lampo rolled his eyes. "I'm doing all I can, Giotto. What else do you want me to do? Fight them?"

"Can't you?" Lampo shook his head. "What about your ring?"

So those gloves had not been enough to distract Giotto away from the topic after all. But what _about_ his ring? It was just a shiny bauble, somehow important enough for not only his father to keep from him since nearly getting kidnapped but for Giotto to keep asking about. Though it was strange that the loud priest had one nearly identical to it, Lampo had to admit.

"What about _yours_? You're the one who saved my life, remember?"

Giotto frowned. "Lampo, that's not how that night went at all. You saved yourself, and your father, and G and me, with your ring."

"That's not how Papa told it."

"But how do you remember it?"

"I don't, nor do I see any reason to."

Giotto's eyes flashed in a manner that terrified Lampo into believing that indeed, Giotto really had to have been the one to kill those kidnappers three years ago. "So you're not going to do anything about the Trissino then?"

Lampo swallowed back his fear. "I _am_ doing something. Weren't you listening?"

Giotto stood and headed out of the room. "You're not doing enough."

The older boy took no care to shut the door shut behind him, letting the exotic melodies of the strange foreigner's flute float into the room. Lampo sighed and leaned further back into the plump couch cushion. He preferred silence, but the songs weren't so bad that he felt the need to get up and close the door himself. If need be, he'd just call on one of his servants to take care of it.

* * *

 _Two months later..._

Knuckle had seen him lurking in the back of the church over the past month. The strange blonde-haired man never took a seat in any of the pews but instead leaned against the back wall with his arms crossed and a scowl on his face to rival G's, but with an air of apathy that the boy could never master. He stayed the entire service, murmuring along to the prayers and making the Sign of the Cross when appropriate. He was always the last to arrive, the last to take communion, and the first to leave.

And so, when he stayed glued to his spot near the doors at the end of Mass as the rest of the parishioners filed out, Knuckle supposed he should have been more surprised.

Everybody gave the man wary glances and moved out of their way so they would not come too close, as though they knew something about this man that Knuckle did not. This piqued Knuckle's curiosity. He had only come to Tuoni five months ago, when Giotto and G decided to take Ugetsu out to explore the town, but he still felt as though he knew everything there was to know about the people here since taking over for the old priest who now laid on his deathbed. Clearly, either Knuckle did not know everyone, or this man was a newcomer that nobody dared to speak of.

As soon as the last of the faithful closed the church doors behind him, the man approached the altar with his hands stuffed into the pockets of his long, dark overcoat and his blue eyes cold and hard. Immediately, Knuckle realized why the townspeople reacted so cautiously to the man. Something about his aura seemed extremely dangerous and bloodthirsty, not unlike the mafia back in Solntse.

He remembered the murmurings of the people of Tuoni about a family called the Trissino, and Knuckle wondered if perhaps this man was one of them. After all, the first day Knuckle saw him was the day of the funeral of a merchant who had been killed in a fire started by the Trissino. Was this man Franco's murderer?

No, Knuckle reprimanded himself. He shall not make such judgments. Just because the man seemed dangerous did not necessarily mean he was.

"Father," said the man simply in greeting. Before Knuckle could respond, he continued. "You seem a little young to be a priest."

Knuckle grinned. "I can't be younger than you."

"That's the problem. But you are a man of God. As am I."

The man pulled out a metallic beaded rosary from his pocket. On the cross, a simply elegant phrase spelled out in Italian, _For God, We Serve._ Knuckle recalled his mentor, Father Andrei, telling him about this symbol once. Consequently, those words were the first Italian words Knuckle ever learned.

He held back a sigh of relief. This man was not Trissino, and he did not kill Franco.

"You work for the Vatican. A secret service, correct?"

The man nodded, and Knuckle noticed a flash of purple on his finger as he slipped the rosary back into his pocket. "Then you know you are to cooperate with me fully. The guard in this town are useless, as you've probably noticed. If you do not give me what I want, I will have to beat it out of you. You realize it is my right and my duty."

Knuckle saw, then, that while this man was not part of the local mafia, he was still indeed extremely dangerous and extremely bloodthirsty. Surely the Vatican would not condone having this man as one of their agents, but Knuckle knew there was much he did not know about how the inner workings of the church worked; Father Andrei said he was better off not knowing. Still, this could not be God's way.

Regardless, Father Andrei warned Knuckle that if he came across someone with such a rosary that he must cooperate, just like the man said. So Knuckle smiled and responded, "Of course, I will help you in any way that I can."

The man nodded. "Good."

"Can I know your name, first?"

"I am in no habit of giving that out."

Knuckle held back a laugh; what a curious man. "Very well, then."

The man narrowed his eyes, but Knuckle did not wince under his scrutinizing gaze. From one of God's servants to another, there was nothing to hide. And indeed, the man knew it, for he finally said, "You may call me Alaude. You will be seeing enough of me that it's worth you knowing. Now tell me all you know about the Trissino Family."

God was good; He had answered the prayers of the Tuoni townspeople by sending an agent of the Vatican to their aid.

"They are mafia. They have been terrorizing the people of Tuoni for some time, to the extreme: exploiting them, murdering them, and many other extremely bad things. As far as I know, they do not come to church so I could not point out who any of them are specifically."

Alaude pursed his lips. "Then what do you know of the Vongola?"

Knuckle started. Giotto? What did Giotto have to do with the Trissino? "He is just a child."

"From what I hear, there's more than one of them."

G, too, then. Of course. "They are both just children. They are not Trissino, I extremely promise you. They would never harm an innocent. If anything, they protect them."

Alaude's eyes flashed. "So you do know them."

"I traveled with them extensively, and so I know. I have seen with my own eyes that when an innocent is being threatened, they step in to stop it at the risk of their own safety and any regard for the laws and customs of the country we were in, to the extreme," said Knuckle, recalling both Solntse and Nagasaki. Then it dawned on Knuckle what they had to do with the Trissino. "They are not the criminals you are looking for. They are your allies."

"You misunderstand me, Father. I am not looking for them because of what they do to help or hurt weak little sheep. But I will warn you that it is unwise for you to protect them."

"They are not in trouble with the Vatican, are they?"

"The Vatican doesn't know about them. Yet."

Knuckle frowned. "So, then, why bother with two harmless children? The Trissino are who you are after, aren't they? They are the ones hurting Tuoni."

"Do not presume to tell me what my job is, Father," Alaude growled. "My business is none of yours. Your job is to answer my questions and tell me what I need to know. Not to protect two little brats interfering with a Vatican agent's work."

Knuckle realized that his patience and temper both were wearing thin by this man. He took a deep breath before answering, "I protect the innocent. That is my job, to the extreme. I thought it was also yours."

For a long moment, the two stared at each other with hard, determined looks, neither one of them backing down from the unspoken challenge that drifted between them. Alaude's eyes were unreadable and his stance more intimidating than when he first approached Knuckle. For a moment, Knuckle wondered if perhaps this man was not above striking a priest and if this secret Vatican agency was actually no better than the mafia. Father Andrei always had had an air of fear and caution when he spoke of this group, after all. Still, Knuckle kept his gaze steady and his head high.

Alaude said, "I misjudged you, Father. You are not weak. But you will be seeing me again."

He turned on his heel and marched out of the church. Knuckle waited until the door closed behind him before letting out a sigh.

He needed to return to Lord Lampo's villa tonight. First, he needed to warn Giotto and G about this man, and then he needed to find out what they had done to warrant his attention in the first place.

* * *

 _Two weeks later..._

Ugetsu woke to a loud crash. He reached for the short sword by his bedside and hopped to his feet, nearly tripping as he realized that he had a healthy distance between the mattress and the floor. That brought him a moment of thought: perhaps the noise was just nothing?

He had been in this strange country for nearing half a year now and still little sounds of the night jerked him awake. The bed Lampo offered him was softer than anything he had ever experienced, and so drifting to sleep proved difficult to begin with. He slept lightly, a habit picked up while traveling the wilderness westward to Italy to help the fellow caravaners keep an ear open for any approaching bandits, though he would not have been of any use after that. It was only within the past couple of months did Giotto place his swords on an inconspicuous shelf in his room, after all.

But the noises that permeated the large house, both within and without, were so unlike the noises of Nagasaki that Ugetsu still had trouble placing what was suspicious and what was normal. Ugetsu wondered if he had heard the noise correctly: it certainly sounded like breaking glass, but he could not be sure. It also sounded like it had come from G's room right next door, so maybe it was nothing. Every so often G broke something around Lampo's house in a fit.

Still, Ugetsu figured he ought to check. If it was just G being G, he needed to make sure that nothing was wrong. If it was something else, he needed to make sure that G was okay.

As Ugetsu stepped out into the hall, his eyes caught sight of a light green head of hair peering from the large bedroom door at the end of the hall. "Lampo-dono?"

The young lord slowly stuck the rest of his head out. "You heard that, too?" he asked shakily.

Ugetsu nodded. "It sounds like it came from G-dono's room."

Lampo made a face but visibly relaxed. "Oh, if that's it then, tell him to quit destroying vases and what not. They're not cheap to replace." And then he vanished back into his room.

Ugetsu chuckled and made his way to G's bedroom. Perhaps Lampo was right. Still, G rarely did something so destructive without reason, no matter how petty those reasons were. And to do it in the middle of the night like this, there had to be a good cause for it.

He slowly opened the door to the room. It was dark and only low murmurings rumbled gently across the floor. Ugetsu took a step inside and saw two shadows by the window, one of the panes shattered. That was the noise, then. The two figures huddled beneath it, frantic but familiar.

"G-dono?" he called out softly.

The pair jumped to their feet, and the taller of the two drew what looked to be a silhouette of an elegant bow. He did not arm an arrow into it, however, pausing just briefly enough to realize he was in no company of an enemy.

"Ugetsu?"

Ugetsu's eyes adjusted with the aid of the moonlight. Both Giotto and G stood against the window, seeming both panicked and relieved. G regained composure first, scowling and dropping the bow in his hand. Giotto followed suit with a nervous smile, his cloak draping over him like a phantom.

"I'm sorry, Ugetsu. Did we wake you?" Giotto asked.

Ugetsu shook his head. "No, Giotto-dono. I was already awake anyway." It was not quite the truth, but his restlessness had not gone unnoticed by any of his three companions, none of whom seemed eager to take their eyes off him yet. Giotto nodded, believing him. "But what happened here? Why is G-dono's window broken?"

And why did he have a bow of all things on his person, but Ugetsu decided that the question was irrelevant at the moment. Surely G would tell him later.

Giotto and G exchanged glances. G offered a characteristically unhelpful shrug. Giotto sighed and dropped his head, but then a look of a thousand thoughts speeding through his mind crossed his face. Ugetsu knew, then, that he would not hear the full truth and that Knuckle had every right to be as worried as he had been the past fortnight.

"We were, ah, walking. Taking a walk," said Giotto. "It's a beautiful night, and we couldn't sleep, so…"

"The door was locked and so we couldn't get back in," G supplemented with a nonchalant wave of his hand. While G was much better at lying than Giotto was, Ugetsu had a feeling that this, at least, was the truth. "We thought that maybe we could sneak into the mansion through my bedroom window but…"

He glared at Giotto, who laughed sheepishly in response. "Well, we got in."

"Not unnoticed, which was the point of not knocking at the door to begin with!"

Despite himself, Ugetsu could not help but to laugh. "But why did you not want to be noticed? Is it—" He paused, wondering how to best say it. "—is it a sin to be out so late?"

"N-no, nothing like that," said Giotto, rubbing the back of his head and again glancing at G for help. "We just didn't want to worry anybody or get anyone into trouble. That's all."

There. That one simple sentence had the complete truth. However, Ugetsu for the life of him could not decipher that truth immediately. From the expressions on both Giotto's and G's faces, Ugetsu knew that questioning them further would bear no fruit; they had no intentions telling anybody what they were really up to. What Giotto said was the reason why.

Ugetsu hoped that whatever they were doing was nothing as bad as Nagasaki, but if they were sneaking around at night like this…

"If you ever need assistance, you know all you have to do is ask, Giotto-dono," Ugetsu found himself saying. "I can help. You know I can."

Giotto stared at Ugetsu, his mouth open ajar and his eyes conflicted. "I—" he started. Then he closed his eyes and sighed. "I know, Ugetsu. Thank you."

"Giotto?" asked G, concerned.

The smaller boy smiled. "But it's nothing. So please don't worry. We'll be fine. I'm going to head back to my room now. I will see you both in the morning. Ugetsu, you better be getting some rest, too. I'll see if one of the maids can't fix you a cup of tea to help with that."

Without looking either Ugetsu or G in the eye, Giotto left the room. Ugetsu stared after him, frowning, before turning to G.

G stowed the bow underneath his bed and, while still kneeling by the bedside, sighed and said, "I know, I know, he's a terrible liar. If that idiota of a priest can see right through that, I expect you did, too. But he's right. You shouldn't worry. We know what we're doing."

"And that is…?"

G hesitated. "I really shouldn't say."

"G-dono, please."

"I really _can't_ say. Ugetsu, believe me when I say that it's for your own good, and the Father's and Lampo's, that you don't know what we're really doing. There's more at work here than we thought."

Ugetsu narrowed his eyes. "G-dono, please do not be so cryptic and expect me to just accept it."

G pursed his lips. "I don't expect you to accept it. But it's what Giotto wants. We'll be fine. I promise."

He mustered a confident smirk and stood. Ugetsu sighed. He did not like this, but G's demeanor was still the same; Ugetsu had learned little more and will not learn anything more, at least not tonight.

"Very well, G-dono," he said as he turned on his heel. He knew not if the anger seeping through his words was not only intentional but desired. "Good night."

* * *

 _One week later..._

They were here.

Alaude stared down the long, red-carpeted corridor. Unconscious bodies littered the trail towards the center of the Trissino holdings. Every other body had one or two wounds from an arrowhead, but the arrows had been dutifully collected as they had in all the other missed encounters with the Guinizelli boys. The rest of the bodies were merely bruised with minor burns, another trait of these street rats that had plagued Alaude for the past three years.

No more. Alaude planned to corner them once and for all tonight. The trap had been simple enough to lay out: after overhearing talk among stray Trissino agents, who had been immediately disposed of, Alaude had gone to the priest with a bit of information that he knew the Father could not ignore. It had not been difficult to piece together that Lord Lampo was the common denominator between the priest and the so-called "Vongola" boys, and Alaude knew that the Trissino plans to take him out once and for all to have full control over Tuoni was the perfect way to get them to act in the most predictable manner.

He followed the sounds of distant fighting. As he stepped over the unconscious men, he reached into his pocket and pulled out his handcuffs, readjusting the purple stone ring on his finger as he did so. Alaude had never seen the need to become attached to any material object, but once he discovered the secrets of the ring and that it would only react to one pair of handcuffs in the entirety of the Vatican, he refused to let either of them go.

The discovery had been purely on accident while sitting in his office in Rome. Alaude had seen little reason to turn the rings over to the Church with three missing, but he had been curious for what the big fuss among the bishops had been about. So he had slipped on one of the rings and found that it had reacted in a warm burst of a violet cloud. Initially, he shrugged it off as merely a nifty little trick until he grabbed the pair of handcuffs on his desk.

After a few sessions of experimentation, Alaude learned how to manipulate the flame and the handcuffs to his will. He knew that this was only a temporary fling; as soon as he discovered the location of the other three rings, he had to finish the job. And yet, Alaude wondered what use they could possibly make of these rings. He had no reason to defy the Vatican but if the rings were merely to be shoved away in a vault…

Alaude stood in front of wooden double doors and heard the battle within. He could worry about the fate of the rings later. He had the boys exactly where he wanted them now.

He ignited the ring and pushed the doors open, taking a moment to absorb the scene around him. Yes, there were the boys from three years ago, older now, but still too familiar. The blonde had orange fire emanating from his forehead and eyes of a crazed madman as he swiftly moved between the Trissino. They still had the coveted bullets, but now it seemed the boy had found clothing that could withstand the power of the flames, for now he was clad in a dark mantle and gloves. The gloves radiated an orange glow, but it was significantly weaker than the one on the boy's forehead. Still, it seemed to be enough to do the trick to neutralize the attacking mafia.

The insolent redhead, the long lost Guinizelli heir, stood a distance away from the midst of the fighting, a group of knocked out Trissino at his feet. The boy drew arrows into the bow in his hands and fired at any men the blonde could not react to in time. Alaude pitied his aim. He was always just shy of the men's hearts.

Alaude then narrowed his eyes at the weapon in Giovanni's hand, recognizing the markings. That bow was another item on the list of treasures the Vatican wanted in their possession. No matter; soon, Alaude would achieve that objective, as well.

The flame on the blonde's forehead vanished. In that instant, his eyes widened as he saw the oncoming fist of one of the Trissino aiming straight for him. He did not see or sense the others circle around him. Giovanni cried out, "Giotto!" while frantically grabbing at his hip for the gun that was snugly tucked in the waistband of his pants.

He would not make it in time, Alaude knew, but that was not why he twirled the handcuffs on his finger, letting the purple flames coat it, and sent the enlarged ring flying towards the group of men surrounding the boy. Alaude had no patience for mercy as the ring tightened around them; the boy had cowered at their feet, and so only the Trissino were caught in the cuffs, the life squeezed out of them.

Alaude released the death grip on the men and returned the handcuffs to their original form. The two boys gaped at him, familiarity dawning in their eyes.

"You!" Giovanni snarled as he drew another arrow into the bow.

Alaude covered the handcuffs in the purple flames again. "Boy, do not be a fool. You saw what I just did to the Trissino and I will not hesitate to do the same to you or your friend."

The Guinizelli heir hesitated but did not back down. "You killed my Family, you Medici bastard."

"I am not Medici," said Alaude, annoyed. Were these boys so naïve that they could not tell a Vatican agent when they saw one? "And I had nothing to do with your Family's deaths. I would not throw around accusations so lightly when someone is about to arrest you."

"Arrest…?" said Giovanni, weighing Alaude's words behind his eyes. He raised the bow. "I don't believe you."

"G, wait," said the blonde as he appeared by the heir's side. Giotto, was it? "I think he's telling the truth."

Exasperated, Giovanni rolled his eyes. "Just like that, you're going to believe him?"

"Well, I know I don't know too much about the mafia, but somehow I don't think that the Medici would send just one person into another mafia's hideout to pretend to be a cop—"

"It's a trap, Giotto. He's not going to take us to jail. He's going to take us straight to the Medici and—"

Alaude cut them off. "If by the Medici you mean that offshoot mafia Family, the boss and his elite were arrested and executed three years ago. That mafia no longer exists. Just like yours, Giovanni Guinizelli. Though everyone assumes you are dead and everyone in Tuoni believes you to be a 'Vongola,' I know better. I am very good at my job."

Giovanni glared. "Your job? And what's that?"

Then realization crept in Giotto's eyes. "You're the Vatican agent Knuckle warned us about, aren't you?"

"If by Knuckle, you mean the priest, then yes," said Alaude with a thin smile. "Now, are you two going to come quietly or do I have to beat you into a pulp first?"

"We're not going anywhere," said Giovanni, aiming the arrow at Alaude. "So don't even try."

"I have little interest in repeating my threats," said Alaude. "And your puny arrows won't have any effect on me as long as your aim is that terrible."

He held up the handcuffs, still infused with the flames. Giotto's eyes widened. "Stop it. G, stand down."

"He won't let us out of here without a fight," snarled Giovanni.

"But he has the same kind of ring as Knuckle and Lampo and—"

Alaude snapped his attention to the blonde. "Ring?" He gently nudged the side of his with his finger. "What do you know about the rings?"

Giotto hesitated. "We—well… we came across them while traveling. One of our friends has a green one that shoots out lightning whenever he gets upset, and another friend has a yellow one that can heal people."

"Did you say that the priest and Lord Lampo were in possession of them?"

If the boy had any inclination to answer, Giovanni did not let him. "It doesn't matter if he has a ring, too. Just because that idiot priest thinks that the rings are some sort of sign from God doesn't mean that he is our ally. Don't be so trusting, Giotto."

"Yes, but… he's not Medici."

"He's going to _arrest_ us."

"It was a risk we knew we were taking when we became vigilantes, G."

Alaude rolled his eyes; he had quite enough of this talk. He would visit the lord and the priest later to retrieve two of the remaining three rings; for now, he had two impertinent children to take in.

Before he could enlarge the handcuffs, a gunshot resonated through the room. Giovanni fell forward, eyes wide in shock and tinged with pain. Giotto cried out for his friend. Alaude gazed past the boys to see the illusive Trissino boss standing at the doorway, cigar hanging in his smirking mouth and a smoking gun in his hand.

"Well, well, this is quite the unusual situation," said the boss smoothly. "The two brats interrupting all my operations working with an out-of-town cop. I didn't know the police forces of Italy were so desperate for help."

"Don't misunderstand," snapped Alaude. "These two are admitted vigilantes and they will be brought in for taking the law into their own hands. But more importantly, you are a menace that caught the attention of the Vatican and for that, only God will have mercy on your soul."

The boss shrugged. "I am not ready to face His judgment yet. In any case, I have two children to dispose of first. I'll deal with you later."

" _No_!" cried Giotto. Orange flames burst from the boy's gloved hands and upon his temple. His eyes were not the crazed mania of before but a deadly calm that made Alaude's spine shiver with anticipation.

Surely no bullet did this. Giovanni laid on the ground with blood flowing from his shoulder as he writhed in pain. His gun remained tucked in the waistband of his pants. He did not issue a shot to have done this. No gunshot had resonated, so nobody lurking in the shadows, a possibility Alaude refused to rule out, could have been the culprit as well. How could this have happened?

"You will _not_ hurt G more," said the boy in a dangerously low and calm voice. Alaude felt the corner of his mouth tug up. "And you will _not_ hurt the people of Tuoni anymore."

The baffled look on the Trissino's face crinkled into smug disgust. "Do you really think—"

But Giotto did not let him finish. He charged forward, powered by his flames. The boss retaliated with gunshot after gunshot that ricocheted off of the boy's mantle, slowing him none. Alaude raised his eyebrows; what was that cloth made of?

Before he could speculate further, Giotto came within arm's distance of the mafioso and landed blow for blow upon his body. The villain, unable to fight back, quickly fell unconscious to the floor, barely bloodied but heavily bruised.

The flames disappeared from Giotto's person, and he stood over the Trissino's body, shaking and panting. Alaude frowned—that battle had not been one at all—and went to Giovanni's side to inspect the wound in his back. It was like any other he had seen before: not untreatable, so long as Tuoni's prison had a doctor. It would do little good to throw a corpse into jail, after all.

As Alaude reached for a pair of dud handcuffs, the ones sensitive to the ring's flames must be used on Giotto, the smaller boy ran to his friend's side.

"G! G!" he cried as he gently nudged him. Giovanni groaned and mumbled slurred words that did not relieve Giotto any. "Come on, we have to get you to Knuckle—"

"You are not going anywhere but to jail," snapped Alaude as he presented both pairs of handcuffs. "You are both under arrest. I thought I made that very clear before. If it makes you feel any better, I will be arresting that priest as well."

"But G might die!"

"That is of little concern to me."

Giotto fell into a despaired silence. As Alaude lit the handcuffs once again, eying Giotto to make sure he did not fall into the same state he had defeated the Trissino boss in, the boy hardened his eyes and said firmly, "You want the rings, don't you? I know where another one is. Take me and G to the church, to where Knuckle is, and not only will I tell you where it is but I'll convince Knuckle and Lampo to give you theirs. And don't arrest any of us! Just the Trissino!"

Alaude snorted. "I will not agree to those terms."

"Then you won't find the third ring."

"I could simply beat it out of you."

Giotto fell into a fighting stance, a flicker of orange appearing where the flames had been before. "Try," he challenged.

Alaude narrowed his eyes and considered taking up the boy on the offer. He was rather curious as to how strong he actually was, and he cared little for the protocol that the Vatican dictated in situations such as these. On the other hand, Alaude had a feeling that if this exchange resulted in Giotto's loss, the boy still would not disclose the location of the final ring, if he was indeed telling the truth about it. For that reason alone, he knew he ought to acquiesce to the boy's deal, though he was loath to leave both boys to continue their vigilante ways.

He sighed. "I have little interest in fighting a child. Very well, then. I will help you get Giovanni to the priest, and I will wait in the church until dawn for you to return with all three rings. Then and only then will I not arrest any of you. Is that very clear?"

Giotto calmed and smiled. "Consider it done."


End file.
